As falácias da economia

"what makes [economists] think that growth (i.e., physical expansion of the economic subsystem into the finite containing biosphere), is not already increasing environmental and social costs faster than production benefits, thereby becoming uneconomic growth, making us poorer, not richer? After all, real GDP, the measure of “economic” growth so-called, does not separate costs from benefits, but conflates them as “economic” activity. How would we know when growth became uneconomic? Remedial and defensive activity becomes ever greater as we grow from an “empty-world” to a “full-world” economy, characterized by congestion, interference, displacement, depletion and pollution. The defensive expenditures induced by these negatives are all added to GDP, not subtracted."

"Beyond a level already reached in many countries GDP growth delivers no more happiness, but continues to generate depletion and pollution. At a minimum we must not just assume that GDP growth is “economic growth” (...)."

"A long run norm of continuous growth could make sense, only if one of the three following conditions were true:

1. if the economy were not an open subsystem of a finite and non-growing biophysical system,
2. if the economy were growing in a non physical dimension, or
3. if the laws of thermodynamics did not hold."

"Development (squeezing more welfare from the same throughput of resources) is a good thing. Growth (pushing more resources through a physically larger economy) is the problem. Limiting quantitative growth is the way to force qualitative development."

"Rich and poor separated by a factor of 500 become almost different species. The main justification for such differences has been that they stimulate growth, which will one day make everyone rich. This may have had superficial plausibility in an empty world, but in our full world it is a fairy tale."

"For the Classical Economists the length of the working day was a key variable by which the worker (self-employed yeoman or artisan) balanced the marginal disutility of labor with the marginal utility of income and of leisure so as to maximize enjoyment of life. (...) We need to make it [the length if the working day] more of a variable subject to choice by the worker. And we should stop biasing the labor–leisure choice by advertising to stimulate more consumption and more labor to pay for it."

Daly, Herman (Lead Author); Robert Costanza (Topic Editor). 2009. "From a Failed Growth Economy to a Steady-State Economy." In: Encyclopedia of Earth. Eds. Cutler J. Cleveland (Washington, D.C.: Environmental Information Coalition, National Council for Science and the Environment). [Published in the Encyclopedia of Earth June 5, 2009; Retrieved June 14, 2009]. <http://www.eoearth.org/article/From_a_Failed_Growth_Economy_to_a_Steady-State_Economy>

Pode ouvir algumas ideias de Herman Daly em http://www.electricpolitics.com/podcast/2007/03/ecological_economics.html.

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Finalmente encontro um economista com dois dedos de testa!! É que, hoje em dia, quase todos os pretensos economistas não vêem um palmo à frente do nariz... falam de coisas que não compreendem... perderam completamente a noção de o que é e para que serve a economia.

O exemplo acabado desta pobreza intelectual generalizada entre os pseudo-economistas que pululam por aí, pode ser encontrado nos "boletins de economia" da comunicação social, onde se fala dos altos e baixos da Bolsa como se se falasse de meteorologia, sem jamais se explicar o significado, as implicações e as causas dessas flutuações. Os referidos boletins de economia só podem servir para uma coisa: ampliar os movimentos eufóricos de compra e venda de acções. Ou seja: funcionam como realimentação positiva. Acontece que a realimentação positiva é precisamente o mecanismo que provoca instabilidade dos sistemas (sejam eles sistemas económicos, meteorológicos, ou quaisquer outros). Portanto, os pseudo-economistas dos dias de hoje -- como esses miúdos armados em espertos que ouvimos logo ao início da manhã nas rádios e televisões -- não fazem mais do que incentivar a instabilidade da economia.

É bom saber que, algures do outro lado do oceano -- naquela nação que tanto gostamos de criticar... -- há laivos de bom senso e de compreensão holística deste complexo sistema económico, ambiental e social chamado Terra.