Rent, Profit, and Degrowth β A Postscript to βCapitalism and Climate Collapseβ
In Capitalism and Climate Collapse, I argued that catastrophic climate collapse cannot be avoided under capitalism because capitalism requires economic growth, economic growth requires energy growth, energy growth requires extensive burning of fossil fuels, and extensive burning of fossil fuels causes catastrophic climate collapse. To avoid collapse, we need to shrink the economy β that is, degrowth β to a sustainable level with respect to energy requirements, and then switch to a steady state economy to stay at that level. What exactly that sustainable level is is debatable, but regardless of whether itβs closer to one third of current closer...
Rent, Debt, and Power
In 2009 Rolling Stone published an article by Matt Taibbi about Goldman Sachs. Taibbi writes: βThe worldβs most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.β The statement is rather unfair to vampire squids, but aside from that detail the characterization is quite appropriate and, moreover, equally applicable to the finance, insurance, and real estate (FIRE) sector as a whole. In Killing the Host, Michael Hudson describes the FIRE sector as parasitic. He writes that βinstead of creating a mutually beneficial symbiosis with...