Alright I am going to easily get slaughtered and possibly neutered but here it goes...
So all this talk about making cars and everything more efficient is just killing me, we all know it has to happen drastically, but is it the right thing to do in case of the economy?
Now heres the big kicker, we are running efficiently correct? according to the PPC, when efficient we are on the curve, but lets say you all want to get more efficient NOW, to do that you have to step out of the curve. What happens when you get out of the curve? You get a special thing called INEFFICIENCY!!!! That is crazy, because due to our technology not going anywhere right now, that would require us to OVERUSE our resources so it would be totally irresponsible and inefficient to be getting more efficiency from our environment at this moment.
You could get there of course if we had some crazy technological advancement and everyone adapted to it, like electrical cars or smog-less factories, or for some cruel reason we could make cows not fart or something...I don't know, this thought came to me while at work so I just had to get it out there to talk to people who want radical change for the betterment of our environment, because its only gonna be hurtful to do anything right now.
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6 comments:
I never said that this stuff made sense in the real world. :) :)
I guess you'd have to look at it like this - if you wanted to increase efficiency, you'd either have to (1) increase the efficiency of your resources (work better, not harder), or (2) somehow increase your resources, which would push the curve out.
Workable, right?
No, not realistic. But workable?
:)
Let's see what others have to say --
So I don't know if you read that Naked Economics book, but it talked a bit about how changes in manufacturing and such go about in the economy and a part of it was creative destruction. The example of the book showed Wal-Mart springing up from no where and taking out all other businesses in the market, except for some giants that existed like Kmart, ShopKo, etc. But most of the small businesses and some larger businesses collapsed because of Wal-Marts tactics. So Wal-Mart has emerged and will be strong until another company takes it out with new creative ideas. I believe that this sort of change has to happen to change from an oil-based country to a different source of energy. I'm sure if a company makes electric, solar, hydrogen or any other car powered by something other than gas that can be supplied to consumers at a feasible price that they can take out the oil companies over time, and hopefully Wal-Mart with them :). Whatever company manages to do that will reign supreme until something else thinks of something better. Hopefully this change happens sooner than later given all of the environmental problems we have...
I dont know that I would agree when you say that technology is at a standstill, but I do think we might be focusing on the wrong types of technology. Some bad examples would be our ability to hold 10000000000000000000000 songs in our pocket at once and not have to pay a dime for them or our ultra clear blu-ray discs or 500 dollar game consoles. I think it may be time to step into new research, which I know is already underway, but the intensity of the research could probably be increased. I know this isnt really related to economics but it is something I had to say. About the economics of the situation, I think that Tony presents a valid point in saying that with the lack of change in the industry, their really is no way to become more environmentally friendly other than changes in technology or efficiency.
is our economy running efficiently? one could argue that we are overusing resources right now. maybe that is the cause of some of the environmental problems.
I will never think of cows in the same way again. I thought my realization about loser cows was inspired but that is something else. Anyway, I do agree with you about us needing an advancement in technology in order to be eco-friendly and efficent. I had to go to work today (amazing) and we are getting all this stuff in that says "Think Green" or "Go Green" and other such eco-friendly sayings. I laugh though because they all come in 50 million pounds of plastic. But all the craziness about "going green" won't work if we can't sustain it.
This isn't one of my weekly comments but...just a warning...watch out for savannah...haha :)
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