Degrowth

What are the problems with growth? Nowadays we use the GDP as a tool for measuring growth. The costs of growth include bad psychological health, long working hours, congestion and pollution. To grow the GDP we want to produce more products. How more the economy in western world grows, how lower the economy in the underdeveloped territories will be. This is because the energy and the materials that are extracted are often in underdeveloped territories that suffer the impacts of extraction. The people that are leaders of factories are in competition with each other to get companies to use their factories. Because of that the hourly rate of the working people is getting lower and lower. Products are getting cheaper so the consumption will grow.

Companies deliberately choose to produce and sell products that have a shorter lifespan so that consumers have to buy a new product more often because it breaks. For producing more products we need more materials and throw away a lot of stuff. This is all bad for the environment. (example Fairphone)

Above a certain level, growth does not increase happiness. It is never enough everybody wants to have more than their neighbors because money and consuming expensive products give you a feeling of power. Degrowth is a shadow concept that doesn't come up often at discussions taking place in the economic sphere because they are mostly focused on getting money.

How to conceive the economy without that concept? Instead of measuring growth coupled to GDP some economists are working on more relevant alternatives such as the Human Development Index (HDI), the ecological footprint or the social health index.Some sectors, such as education, medical care, or renewable energy, will need to flourish in the future, while others, such as dirty industries or the financial sector shrink. The result will be degrowth.

Degrowth in the North will liberate ecological space for growth in the South. Degrowth in the North will make natural resources and industrial goods more accessible to the developing South.

We need to search for an economic model that includes the cost of environmental damage. More taxes for companies that produce in an unsustainable way (not recycled materials, products that do not last long etc.) and subsidies for companies who do (recycled materials, products that do last long etc.). We need to work with maximum income for individuals but also company’s. When we invest that money in better education, medical care, and renewable energy. We can work with laws: for longer guarantee periods, the right to repair, for take-back systems, and protect the public space from advertisements telling us to buy more and more - both offline and online. (Examples sweatshirt and swapfiets)

'Sharing’, ‘simplicity’, ‘sociability’, ‘care’ and ‘equality’ will be the significations of what this society might look like.’