Comment on I have an idea ☝️

• lmmarsano@lemmynsfw.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  If every economy is capitalist no matter degree of government planning, regulation, & control, then by your standard non-capitalist economies are a myth.

  Demand for population growth is a general problem of economic growth rather than type of economic system. Before capitalism, even subsistence farmers would bear more children for the additional labor.

  Central planning economies can be as or more destructive than the more capitalist ones: type of economy seems to have little bearing there, too. The USSR aggressively industrialized & would consistently pursue economic growth (to raise standards of living). It comes up in the Soviet constitution of 1977:

  • labor, free from exploitation, as the source of growth
  • continuous improvement of their living standards (art. 39)
  • steady growth of the productive forces (art. 40).

  Despite their command economy, their pollution was proportionately worse than the US’s

  Total emissions in the USSR in 1988 were about 79% of the US total. Considering that the Soviet GNP was only some 54% of that of the USA, this means that the Soviet Union generated 1.5 times more pollution than the USA per unit of GNP.

  Their planners considered pollution control

  unnecessary hindrance to economic development and industrialization

  and

  By the 1990s, 40% of Russia’s territory began demonstrating symptoms of significant ecological stress, largely due to a diverse number of environmental issues, including deforestation, energy irresponsibility, pollution, and nuclear waste.

  And this generously glosses over the extent of water contamination, hazardous dumping of toxic & nuclear waste into oceans, etc.

  The dependence on labor, capacity for environmental destruction, and demand for economic growth are not particular to any type of economy: they’re general.

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