externalities Archives – Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy

A Sustainable True-Cost Economy Promises an Escape from Massive Water Pollution

August 26, 2015/2 Comments/in Economic Policy, Environment, Steady State Economy, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

by Brent Blackwelder

A year ago, I wrote about how a true-cost steady state economy would deal with water pollution. Last August, the alarming green slime at the west end of Lake Erie was so bad that it shut down Toledo’s water supply for half a million people. Who would pay the tremendous damages caused by the green slime? Certainly not the industrial agricultural interests who were responsible for about two-thirds of the problem!

The Future History of Political Economy – Part 2

June 10, 2015/8 Comments/in Energy, Steady State Economy, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

by Eric Zencey

Ecological Economics represents the extension into economics of the thermodynamic revolution of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In physics, that revolution dethroned Newton and brought relativity. In biology, it was midwife to the birth of ecology, the study of ecosystems as wholes in which energy networks—food webs—are a defining structure. In chemistry the laws of thermodynamics brought clarity and rigor to a science that struggled to bring theoretical unity to diverse phenomena.

The Future History of Political Economy – Part 1

June 3, 2015/2 Comments/in Economic Growth, Economic Policy, Steady State Economy, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

by Eric Zencey

Ecological Economics and its corollary, steady-state economic thinking, represent a step forward for the discipline of economics and also a return to how it was practiced in the past. In the nineteenth century, economics was a part of a larger enterprise: political economy, the integrated treatment of morals and economics, ultimate ends and efficient means. Late in that century economics calved off from political economy, leaving behind political science and political philosophy as the residuum.

Progress Toward a True-Cost Economy Comes from Renewable Energy

May 21, 2015/4 Comments/in Energy, Environment, Jobs and Employment, Steady State Economy, Sustainability, Technology, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

by Brent Blackwelder

A renewable energy revolution is sweeping the planet. This revolution has profound implications because it signals that the global economy is moving to stop the growth of our human carbon footprint.

The global economy has run for a century primarily on fossil fuels but is now undergoing a rapid transition to a global economy based significantly on rooftop solar, wind, and efficiency. This is a tangible movement toward a steady state economy because with wind and solar,

Potential New Allies in the Effort to Achieve a Sustainable True Cost Economy

February 11, 2015/4 Comments/in Economic Growth, Environment, Population, Steady State Economy, Sustainability, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

Dr. Blackwelder discusses how those in faith-based communities can become powerful allies for those of us seeking an economy that meets peoples’ needs without undermining the life support systems of the planet.

Giant Mats of Green Slime in Lake Erie Signal a Need for New Economic Approaches to Pollution

August 21, 2014/1 Comment/in Environment, Food and Agriculture, Sustainability, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

What do we do when water supplies are cut off to a city of 400,000 people?

Transformative Common Sense in Vermont

August 14, 2014/2 Comments/in Environment, Steady State Economy, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

Vermont moves to the forefront of a quiet revolution to integrate GPI into social and economic policy.

The Hidden Costs of Cheater Economics on Human Health & the Future of Life on Earth

May 12, 2014/4 Comments/in Environment, Food and Agriculture, Sustainability, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

Brent Blackwelder provides an overview of some of the ecological costs of economic growth, as presented in Tony Juniper’s latest book, What has Nature Ever Done for Us?