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Explore the impacts of the 2008/9 economic crisis and the relentless consumption-driven trajectory of our society that is depleting Earth's resources. Discover historical warnings and prophetic voices regarding our unsustainable consumption patterns, reflecting on the cycle of economic confusion and the need for a shift towards necessary consumption. Understand the significance of energy policy, resource scarcity, and the looming consequences of unbridled consumption. Dive into the complexities of the Production Machine, the rise of suburbia, global market shifts, and the implications of a finite Earth. Witness the persistence of the Mega Bubble and the volatility and collapse it may bring in the New World Order.
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Can you see it coming? Unbridled consumption: 2008/9: The period when the Mega Bubble Burst
2008 US Reduction • As a result of economic conditions did actually occur – but scale similar to the recent past so Big Deal …
Historical Warnings About • The Consumption Machine have been vigorously made but no one actually seems to care. • As a result, we are on a trajectory of exhausting most all of earth’s resources over a 250 year period (1850-2100)
Henry Seidel Canby 1926 • “The outstanding fact in mass civilization as it exists in America and Western Europe to-day is that it moves with confidence in only one direction. The workers, after their escape from the industrial slavery of the last century, have only one plan for the future upon which they can unite, a greater share in material benefits. The possessors of capital have only one program upon which they agree, a further exploitation of material resources, for the greater comfort of the community and themselves. The professional classes have only one professional instinct in common, to discover new methods by which man's comfort may be made secure. “
Dorothy Sayers 1942 • I do not think we will ever escape from the appalling squirrel-cage of economic confusion in which we have been madly turning for the last three centuries – the cage in which we landed ourselves by acquiescing in a social system based upon Envy and Avarice. A society in which consumption has to be artificially stimulated in order to keep production going is a society founded on trash and waste and such a society is a house built upon sand.
Even more Prophetic • When the war is over, are we likely, and do we want to keep this attitude to work and the results of that work? Or are we prepared to go back to our old habits of thought? Because I believe that our answer to this question determines the whole economic future of society. At the moment we are not making this decision – its being made for us.
Skyrocketing Consumption • Driven primarily by US Westward expansion, suburbia beginning in the early 1950s. • General steady increase in US and European to “export goods to the world” (The “2nd British Empire”) • China emerges into global market starting in 2003 • Earth remains finite
Result of Finite Earth • Resource Scarcity:
Production vs. Scarcity • Creates an unregulated futures market
The New World Order • May well be defined by a transition away from conspicuous consumption towards necessary consumption • Only one mega bubble allowed per planet – but historically why do we let it happen anyway? • The world is systematically trying to re-inflate the Mega Bubble proving that we don’t seem to learn very easily