Confronting the dilemma of growth. A response to Warlenius.
This commentary responds to a recent article purporting to identify ‘limits to degrowth’. This paper clarifies and sets in context the tensions between growth rates and decoupling rates on which the contested argument is based, disputing the claim that growth is the best way to achieve high rates of decoupling.
Energy transition risk: The impact of declining energy return on investment (EROI) | Journal Paper
The TranSim modelling work shows that the negative effects associated with the transition—recession, stagnation, stagflation, increasing inequality and asset stranding—are positively related to the capital intensity of green energy production and reductions in EROI. Policy makers should pay close attention to the overall EROI of the entire energy system when determining energy policy. If significant reductions in EROI are unavoidable, then policy could be used to mitigate some of its negative economic effects.
Modelling Transition Risk | Blog
Tim Jackson summarises the recent TRansit project which has pioneered a novel agent-based, stock-flow consistent macro-economic model. Tim discusses the findings from the project and sets them in the context of the Bank of England’s work on ‘transition risk’.
The Transition to a Sustainable Prosperity | Journal Paper by Tim Jackson and Peter Victor
This paper presents a stock-flow consistent (SFC) macroeconomic simulation model for Canada. Contrary to the widely accepted view, the results suggest that ‘green growth’ (in the Carbon Reduction Scenario) may be slower than ‘brown growth’. More importantly, we show (in the Sustainable Prosperity Scenario) that improved environmental and social outcomes are possible even as the growth rate declines to zero.
Using critical slowing down indicators to understand economic growth rate variability and secular stagnation | NATURE paper
Global economic stability could be difficult to recover in the wake of the Covid-19, this Nature article finds. Even before the Covid-19 crisis, many of the world’s leading economies were experiencing larger slower growth cycles (recession cycles), suggesting precisely such a period of critical slowing down in the economic system. This analysis suggests that the added weight of the Covid-19 crisis may result in one of the weakest and most unstable recoveries in recorded history for many economies.
Biodiversity in a post-growth environment | Evidence submission to the EAC Possible Future Inquiry
In early Spring this year, written submissions were invited to aid the Committee in prioritising its future programme of work. CUSP director Tim Jackson submitted evidence, making the case for necessary innovations in governance and a realistic and responsible approach to the management of the economy: Sustainable Development Goals and the 2050 Vision for Biodiversity cannot be achieved without transformative change, the conditions for which have to be put in place now.
Unravelling the claims for (and against) green growth | Science Article by Tim Jackson and Peter Victor
It is clear that the larger the economy becomes, the more difficult it is to decouple that growth from its material impacts... This isn't to suggest that decoupling itself is either unnecessary or impossible. On the contrary, decoupling well-being from material throughput is vital if societies are to deliver a more sustainable prosperity—for people and for the planet. (This article is posted on the Science website).
LowGrow SFC—A stock-flow-consistent ecological macroeconomic model for Canada | Paper
This working paper by Tim Jackson and Peter Victor presents a stock-flow consistent (SFC) simulation model of a national economy, calibrated on the basis of Canadian data. LowGrow SFC describes the evolution of the Canadian economy in terms of six financial sectors. Contrary to the accepted wisdom, the results indicate the feasibility of improved environmental and social outcomes, even as the growth rate declines to zero.
2050 is too late—we must drastically cut emissions much sooner
At current rates of reduction, the UK fair carbon budget will be spent in just four years' time, Tim Jackson writes in his blog for The Conversation. "Every year that progress is delayed, the challenge only gets bigger", he argues, we don't only need a credible strategy on zero carbon targets, but also emission pathways, with a defined level of negative emission technologies.
“All Models are Wrong”—The challenge of modelling ‘deep decarbonisation | Paper
This briefing paper summarises the dilemma associated with using mainstream, macroeconomic models to guide disruptive, transformative change such as those that might occur under ‘deep decarbonisation’: a rapid transition to a net-zero carbon economy. Some form of macro-economic modelling framework is essential to enable policy-makers to exercise short- and long-term fiscal responsibility. Incremental models based on historical behaviour, however, are a poor guide to outcomes under circumstances of disruptive change.
How the light gets in—The science behind growth scepticism
The Entropy Law still matters. CUSP director Tim Jackson responds to Michael Liebreich’s essay on the ‘The secret of eternal growth’.—"Because we are intelligent does not mean that there is no such thing as limits. We cannot usefully ‘imagine’ the available carbon budget to be bigger than it actually is. Our ‘wonder’ will not in itself preserve the species lost precipitously in recent decades in the relentless pursuit of eternal growth."
LowGrow SFC: An ecological macroeconomic simulation model
System dynamics model by Tim Jackson and Peter Victor is live now, developing sustainable prosperity scenarios for the Canadian economy out to 2067. LowGrow SFC is part of a suite of system dynamics models developed by Tim Jackson and Peter Victor, including SIGMA, which addresses the key challenge of inequality in the context of declining growth rates; and FALSTAFF, which explores the financial and economic dimensions of a post-growth economy.
Confronting inequality in a post-growth world – Basic income, factor substitution and the future of work | Paper
Piketty argued that slow growth rates inevitably lead to rising inequality. If true, this hypothesis would pose serious challenges for a ‘post-growth’ society. If true, this hypothesis would pose serious challenges for a ‘post-growth’ society. Fiscal responses to this dilemma include Piketty’s own suggestion to tax capital assets and more recent suggestions to provide a universal basic income that would allow even the poorest in society to meet basic needs.
