Having taken care of the whole family, even the dog (?) through coughs that cling on for weeks and sap you of energy, it is now my turn. This means that I have a mountain of work backing up, the house is a mess, the garden and allotment untouched, minecraft is 'babysitting', dinner will be takeaway and.....I have had some time for reading :-)
Yesterday I read the latest post on The Archdruid Report. Don't be fooled by the light-hearted title 'A pink slip for the progress fairy', it is rather heavy, scary stuff, the kind that can make you feel depressed. If you have already read the likes of The Limits to Growth, then you are probably mentally/ emotionally prepared. Otherwise it may be a good one to skip.
To summarise, Mr Greer has studied history and proposes that all civilisations rise, then collapse slowly over the period of 100-300 years. The collapse isn't apocalyptic in the sense of a sudden catastrophic event ending everything. More that a succession of war, drought, disease, famine, flood and more war, interspersed with relatively peaceful periods, will define the downward slope, as it has for all previous civilisations.
It does look like we must be approaching the collapse stage, but Mr Greer is of the opinion that the Western civilisation started collapsing in 1914, with World War I, the Spanish flu pandemic, the Great Depression, World War II and the dissolution of the British Empire. The last 60 years in comparison have been a relatively stable period, where civilisation has been flourishing particularly well due to the exploitation of non-renewable energy resources. The second act is imminent though and could be triggered by a number of factors, such as an Ebola pandemic or financial crash.
The easy bit to predict is that our civilisation will decline, but predicting the details of how and when is impossible. So Mr Greer paints a fictional account of what the next 300 years might look like in his post, to better illustrate what he is talking about.
I have read Mr Greer's The Long Descent before, so was acquainted with his general collapse scenario, but had not read before his interpretation of the years 1914 - 1954. It sort of makes sense to me. Those years were hard times and the British Empire didn't survive in tact. I had the impression that we came through those years, but under a burden of war debt, scarred by bombing, with aging machinery and infrastructure, and it was an enormous struggle trying to build things back up again.
The BBC have a great population graphic for the UK, which shows the impact of the World Wars and Spanish flu on the population. I also find it amazing that the birth rate in 2011 is still lower than in 1911. The increase in UK population is a result of a lower death rate, meaning people are living longer. The average age of the population in 1911 was 25, whereas in 2011 it is 40. That means that half the population of the UK is 40 or over.
But if the years from 1914 to 1954 were the first stages of collapse then most people survived. It was really just a partial collapse. Things could have been a lot worse. In fact we learnt lessons about looking after each other, so the years following saw the birth of the National Health Service. Even during WWII lessons had been learnt from WWI, in that rationing was introduced quickly and changes were made to improve the prospects for the poorest during tough times. Looking after the health and basic needs of the poor are the reason we have such a low death rate now.
But here's the thing, most people weren't expecting any of it. We get on with our day-to-day lives and do the best we can. Some days are happy, some sad, but they end and the next day arrives. We aren't supposed to know what is around the corner, otherwise how do we find the courage to face it? What Mr Greer is really saying is that the death rate is going to increase somehow, because our civilisation is out of balance. It is a natural cycle of events beyond our control.
It does seem that many more people in the US are concerned about collapse and are being prepared and stockpiling. Whereas in the UK it seems we are oblivious to a possible collapse. Or maybe we see it, but are too conscious of social protocols and what other people think to act. Or else just more laid back about it - what will be, will be. Which is it do you think?
This brings me onto Wendy's recent posts on her blog Surviving the Suburbs. She has been talking about useful lists. Lists of things we should probably have at hand in order to be prepared for the worst. Now don't freak out at me, but weapons is one of the things on the list. This is normally the point where us Brits decide it is all extremist doomsday scenario stuff and switch to more polite conversation. The trouble is that almost everything else on these lists makes sense. It is handy to have a torch or headlamp in case of a blackout or even just blowing a fuse. And if you have a torch then spare batteries are helpful, especially if you don't use that torch very often. Common sense right?
And whilst I have this cough, the prospect of running out of loo roll or sugar, really doesn't appeal, because I would rather not have to shop this week if I can get away with it. Wouldn't it be nice to know that you had a small stockpile of some of the essential items stored away just in case? Last year there was a major water leak in my area around Christmas, which caused havoc for some families. It would be a good reason to keep at least a few gallons of water in the garage to tide you over. Does this seem extreme?
What about phone numbers? Do you know the numbers of your friends and family or will they all be lost if you damage your mobile? And do you keep spare cash at home, just in case you run out and need some desperately? And does your car always have at least half a tank of fuel, a blanket, first aid kit and bottle of water handy?
The thing is, you don't have to believe in a doomsday scenario, but labelling prepping as extremist and not even considering it, means that some of the practical stuff doesn't get discussed. Some people aren't prepared for even basic emergencies like the boiler breaking down, let alone a major power cut which is a real threat this winter.
It relates to the post a few weeks back about resilience. It may be frugal and efficient to only buy the items you need this week, but it is far more resilient if you have a cupboard full of tins, rice and pasta to fall back on when something unexpected happens. Even more resilient if you have some seeds and know how to make use of them.
How far do you go to be prepared?
Showing posts with label Population. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Population. Show all posts
Friday, 24 October 2014
Monday, 9 June 2014
Inequality and carbon emissions
I recently watched this short clip of an interview with Christine Lagarde of the IMF on the BBC News website, and it has been in my thoughts ever since.
Surprisingly, as the IMF are champions for austerity measures, which inevitably squeeze the poorest members of the population the most, Christine Lagarde is making a point about inequality.
"...Inequality is rising and, to the extent that inequality is not particularly supportive of sustainable growth, it's an issue...."
'Sustainable' and 'Growth' really should not be used in the same sentence, because as George Monbiot recently pointed out in his post The Impossibility of Growth, growth cannot just continue indefinitely. I believe she means 'Continuous Growth', which is a very far cry from anything remotely sustainable..... but I digress.
"....Over the last 30 years, inequality has risen significantly. For instance the top 1% has increased its share of wealth in 24 out of 26 advanced economies. And if you take some of the Oxfam numbers for instance, the numbers are quite striking actually. If you take the 85 wealthiest people in the World, they can all fit in a double-decker bus right, well they have more amongst themselves than half the population of the World, the poorest half of course, but that is 3.5 billion people...."
There is so much about this that is sooooooooo wrong. Where do I even start?
Just for a moment put aside the fact that Christine Lagarde is listening to and taking note of reports from Oxfam, which seems quite a positive development. And forget the ridiculous notion of anyone with that much wealth stepping foot on a common London bus. Let's just stick to the key message, that 85 people have as much wealth as 3.5 billion people.
3.5 billion people is a lot to comprehend. It is more than the total population of Europe, Africa and the Americas put together. That is a lot of people. Many of them have very little, over 1 billion are barely subsisting on $1 a day.
Hans Rosling used a wealth chart shown above in the documentary Don't Panic - The Facts About Population which I have discussed previously here. The 7 people depicted along the bottom of the chart represent the 7 billion people in the world and above it shows the distribution of the wealth. More than 1 billion on the left of the chart are below the extreme poverty line, barely able to feed themselves or afford shoes. The 1 billion on the right can afford cars and even to travel by aeroplane and earn an average $100 a day.
Chances are if you are reading this then you are in the right hand side of the graph. $100 dollars a day is around £60 at the current exchange rate. To put that in perspective, the minimum wage for over 21's in the UK is £6.31 an hour, so for an 8 hour day that would be £50. For those that are unemployed and depending on income support the minimum they would receive is £56.80 a week, which is just £11 a day or $18 a day (calculated with a 5 day working week for comparison).
£11 will buy very little in the UK and would not be enough to afford to run a car, probably not even a moped, but certainly a basic bike. In the UK we have a safety net intended to mean that everyone can feed themselves, but as this minimum has not been rising enough to match inflation over the years there have been reports of hungry children in schools and people having to choose between eating or keeping warm. The government has combatted this with winter fuel payments to help cover heating costs, free insulation and boilers for those on benefits, and is now introducing free school meals for all children under 8. And of course we have free healthcare for everyone.
Hans Roslings graph needs to be extended on the right hand side if we want to show where the richest 85 people would be. Past the $1,000 mark which signifies the top 1% in the US, and on past $10,000 and $100,000 a day mark. We still haven't reached the 1,645 billionaires in the World (according to Forbes magazine) let alone the top 85, who are around the $1,000,000 a day mark. Bill Gates, currently the Worlds richest man again, earns an estimated £8.8 million or $14.8 million a day, so is past the $10,000,000 mark! Now we can see what Christine Lagarde means about inequality.
Why can't we afford to provide a safety net to cover the basic human needs for the people in the rest of the world? It doesn't look like there isn't enough wealth, just that we don't like sharing it fairly. Maybe we need a Greed Tax? What do you think?
In Switzerland they took a vote recently on whether to limit the pay of the top executives to no more than 12 times that of the lowest paid worker in their company. This is a very clever idea, because it would stop wages at the top getting out of control without first increasing the wages at the bottom. Unfortunately, this did not get enough votes to be approved. If minimum wage in the UK is £50 a day, then the maximum earnings of the highest paid individual in the company could not exceed £600 a day on this system, without having to increase wages at the bottom. £600 a day is a bit more than the Prime Minister currently earns, but on the scale above it doesn't seem a lot does it?
Equality is really important for a healthy society and I would thoroughly recommend reading The Spirit Level by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett as an eye-opening introduction to the effects of inequality.
For me there is another reason why understanding the disparity of wealth is important. When we look at reducing carbon emissions or fossil fuel consumption which side of Hans Rosling's graph should we be focusing on? The poorest billion who only use as much wood as they can collect themselves, or the richest billion who can afford large houses filled with 'stuff', and travel long distances for pleasure?
The more money we have available to spend on consumer goods, fast cars, flights abroad and large houses, the more fossil fuels we use and carbon emissions we create. I found this Wikipedia list showing the global difference between vehicle ownership and it indicates how different the oil consumption will be. The US has 797 motor vehicles per 1,000 people and the UK has 519. Whereas China only has 183 motor vehicles per thousand people, India 41 and Bangladesh just 3 (2010).
I am a supporter of carbon rationing for this reason. Rationing carbon would mean that everyone gets a share or a quota of 'carbon emissions' or energy each year, in the form of a plastic credit card. Every time you fill up your car with fuel, pay your energy bills or buy goods from a store, you swipe your carbon card too and are using up your carbon quota. If it was important for you to fly half way round the World to visit family, then you would either have to reduce your carbon emissions in other areas or buy quotas from someone who hasn't used theirs.
This won't stop the rich from travelling, as they could invest in a fleet of electric vehicles running on renewable energy or just buy more quotas. But buying more quotas acts as a tax on energy consumption, above a certain level. It focuses attention on reducing energy consumption, and helps people see their actual consumption levels in perspective. The quotas would have to start off at a fair amount and then reduce each year in order to reach reduction targets.
There would be grumbles at first, especially among the more affluent, but this is a very fair system and potentially could provide an extra income stream for those who are frugal with their energy consumption. The scheme promoted in the UK is called "Tradable Energy Quotas" and was endorsed by David and Ed Milliband when they were Secretary of State for the Environment. There is no hope of TEQs re-emerging under the current government, but maybe after the next election they will be back on the agenda.
Surprisingly, as the IMF are champions for austerity measures, which inevitably squeeze the poorest members of the population the most, Christine Lagarde is making a point about inequality.
"...Inequality is rising and, to the extent that inequality is not particularly supportive of sustainable growth, it's an issue...."
'Sustainable' and 'Growth' really should not be used in the same sentence, because as George Monbiot recently pointed out in his post The Impossibility of Growth, growth cannot just continue indefinitely. I believe she means 'Continuous Growth', which is a very far cry from anything remotely sustainable..... but I digress.
"....Over the last 30 years, inequality has risen significantly. For instance the top 1% has increased its share of wealth in 24 out of 26 advanced economies. And if you take some of the Oxfam numbers for instance, the numbers are quite striking actually. If you take the 85 wealthiest people in the World, they can all fit in a double-decker bus right, well they have more amongst themselves than half the population of the World, the poorest half of course, but that is 3.5 billion people...."
There is so much about this that is sooooooooo wrong. Where do I even start?
Just for a moment put aside the fact that Christine Lagarde is listening to and taking note of reports from Oxfam, which seems quite a positive development. And forget the ridiculous notion of anyone with that much wealth stepping foot on a common London bus. Let's just stick to the key message, that 85 people have as much wealth as 3.5 billion people.
3.5 billion people is a lot to comprehend. It is more than the total population of Europe, Africa and the Americas put together. That is a lot of people. Many of them have very little, over 1 billion are barely subsisting on $1 a day.
Hans Rosling used a wealth chart shown above in the documentary Don't Panic - The Facts About Population which I have discussed previously here. The 7 people depicted along the bottom of the chart represent the 7 billion people in the world and above it shows the distribution of the wealth. More than 1 billion on the left of the chart are below the extreme poverty line, barely able to feed themselves or afford shoes. The 1 billion on the right can afford cars and even to travel by aeroplane and earn an average $100 a day.
Chances are if you are reading this then you are in the right hand side of the graph. $100 dollars a day is around £60 at the current exchange rate. To put that in perspective, the minimum wage for over 21's in the UK is £6.31 an hour, so for an 8 hour day that would be £50. For those that are unemployed and depending on income support the minimum they would receive is £56.80 a week, which is just £11 a day or $18 a day (calculated with a 5 day working week for comparison).
£11 will buy very little in the UK and would not be enough to afford to run a car, probably not even a moped, but certainly a basic bike. In the UK we have a safety net intended to mean that everyone can feed themselves, but as this minimum has not been rising enough to match inflation over the years there have been reports of hungry children in schools and people having to choose between eating or keeping warm. The government has combatted this with winter fuel payments to help cover heating costs, free insulation and boilers for those on benefits, and is now introducing free school meals for all children under 8. And of course we have free healthcare for everyone.
Hans Roslings graph needs to be extended on the right hand side if we want to show where the richest 85 people would be. Past the $1,000 mark which signifies the top 1% in the US, and on past $10,000 and $100,000 a day mark. We still haven't reached the 1,645 billionaires in the World (according to Forbes magazine) let alone the top 85, who are around the $1,000,000 a day mark. Bill Gates, currently the Worlds richest man again, earns an estimated £8.8 million or $14.8 million a day, so is past the $10,000,000 mark! Now we can see what Christine Lagarde means about inequality.
Why can't we afford to provide a safety net to cover the basic human needs for the people in the rest of the world? It doesn't look like there isn't enough wealth, just that we don't like sharing it fairly. Maybe we need a Greed Tax? What do you think?
In Switzerland they took a vote recently on whether to limit the pay of the top executives to no more than 12 times that of the lowest paid worker in their company. This is a very clever idea, because it would stop wages at the top getting out of control without first increasing the wages at the bottom. Unfortunately, this did not get enough votes to be approved. If minimum wage in the UK is £50 a day, then the maximum earnings of the highest paid individual in the company could not exceed £600 a day on this system, without having to increase wages at the bottom. £600 a day is a bit more than the Prime Minister currently earns, but on the scale above it doesn't seem a lot does it?
Equality is really important for a healthy society and I would thoroughly recommend reading The Spirit Level by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett as an eye-opening introduction to the effects of inequality.
For me there is another reason why understanding the disparity of wealth is important. When we look at reducing carbon emissions or fossil fuel consumption which side of Hans Rosling's graph should we be focusing on? The poorest billion who only use as much wood as they can collect themselves, or the richest billion who can afford large houses filled with 'stuff', and travel long distances for pleasure?
The more money we have available to spend on consumer goods, fast cars, flights abroad and large houses, the more fossil fuels we use and carbon emissions we create. I found this Wikipedia list showing the global difference between vehicle ownership and it indicates how different the oil consumption will be. The US has 797 motor vehicles per 1,000 people and the UK has 519. Whereas China only has 183 motor vehicles per thousand people, India 41 and Bangladesh just 3 (2010).
I am a supporter of carbon rationing for this reason. Rationing carbon would mean that everyone gets a share or a quota of 'carbon emissions' or energy each year, in the form of a plastic credit card. Every time you fill up your car with fuel, pay your energy bills or buy goods from a store, you swipe your carbon card too and are using up your carbon quota. If it was important for you to fly half way round the World to visit family, then you would either have to reduce your carbon emissions in other areas or buy quotas from someone who hasn't used theirs.
This won't stop the rich from travelling, as they could invest in a fleet of electric vehicles running on renewable energy or just buy more quotas. But buying more quotas acts as a tax on energy consumption, above a certain level. It focuses attention on reducing energy consumption, and helps people see their actual consumption levels in perspective. The quotas would have to start off at a fair amount and then reduce each year in order to reach reduction targets.
There would be grumbles at first, especially among the more affluent, but this is a very fair system and potentially could provide an extra income stream for those who are frugal with their energy consumption. The scheme promoted in the UK is called "Tradable Energy Quotas" and was endorsed by David and Ed Milliband when they were Secretary of State for the Environment. There is no hope of TEQs re-emerging under the current government, but maybe after the next election they will be back on the agenda.
Sunday, 17 November 2013
Population growth
I get into debates about population growth quite regularly, whether it is regarding the justification to build homes for 10,000 people on my doorstep, or a wider global population debate. I have always felt that population is stabilising, due to limitations on resources.
Well last week BBC2 aired an amazing presentation by Professor Hans Rosling using UN data to demonstrate what we don't know but should know about the population. If you haven't seen it then please take the time to watch it, because it is totally amazing the figures that he presents, in a very down-to-earth manner.
(Sorry - Youtube video removed, but you can still watch it here
http://www.gapminder.org/videos/dont-panic-the-facts-about-population/ )
What I like the most is how the World has been changed by individual peoples choices. If we can do this to stabilise population growth then we can do it to eliminate poverty and prevent climate change. Makes the future seem brighter :)
Well last week BBC2 aired an amazing presentation by Professor Hans Rosling using UN data to demonstrate what we don't know but should know about the population. If you haven't seen it then please take the time to watch it, because it is totally amazing the figures that he presents, in a very down-to-earth manner.
(Sorry - Youtube video removed, but you can still watch it here
http://www.gapminder.org/videos/dont-panic-the-facts-about-population/ )
What I like the most is how the World has been changed by individual peoples choices. If we can do this to stabilise population growth then we can do it to eliminate poverty and prevent climate change. Makes the future seem brighter :)
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