GROWTH AT ANY COST MANTRA

 

All around the world economic growth continues to be the alleged panacea of all our ills. Which is complete nonsense even on the face of it. Yes it would be nice to have enough food, water, shelter, health care etc. for everyone on the planet but it is an impossible task getting worse everyday. Why is that you ask? Well there are more and more people on the same size planet everyday. There is however not an automatic and corresponding increase in those life sustaining items everyday as the population continues to grow.  Combined with that is the fact that economic growth at least partially depends on population growth. In other words it's a case of having an ever expanding market for your goods be they foodstuffs, clothing or automobiles.

Population growth leads to some awful environmental problems from basic dumping and overflows from sewage treatment plants into our lakes and rivers as well as forest removal in order to grow more food for more people. Then of course we have climate change which certainly is attributed to more petroleum uses whether for heating our homes or running cars and trucks delivering more products to more people. Climate change including rising ocean levels as ice caps melt is causing havoc with flooding of coastal towns and cities. Greater heat worldwide is causing massive increases in both the numbers and magnitude of violent weather events resulting in more hurricanes and tornados destroying property and lives. Both droughts and floods are increasing in numbers and both affect food production which is already under stress.

Water shortages used to be an issue in third world countries. Now countries are looking for water sources outside their own borders. Water, whether groundwater or surface water, is in greater demand even as our industries continue to ignore pollution laws with little or no public recourse against them. Here in Elmira the now responsible chemical company are bragging about their fine "cleanup" work even as the Ministry of Environment rewrites the Control Order (1991) that was supposed to restore our local aquifers destroyed by Uniroyal Chemical. The deadline is 2028 and it won't happen although desperation may cause attempts to reopen parts of the aquifer to drinking water pumping while pretending to isolate other more contaminated parts. 

This is all our futures unless growth is more seriously limited and supervised.