Letters to the Editor

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The original dismal economist did not anticipate the productivity explosion bequeathed by technology. But when does the magic stop?
  • Service economies have no real sustainability.

    The food problem isn't so much a matter of quantity as quality. When millions of rural Chinese move into cities, their diets change, and they consumer more calories. One prediction states that 2/3's of the worlds people will live in cities by the end of the century.

    The solution is two fold. Stop the urbanization of the worlds population, which is also the leading catalyst for terrorism. Terrorism is a city problem.

    City dwellers effectively jump start the collective metabolism of society. Thoreau mentions this in Walden. It's not a matter of having more to eat, its having meat instead of grain and vegetables. The reason people are moving into the world's cities is almost baffling. In the last century cities were near the centers of industrialization. The internet has given people the choice to work and live just about anywhere they choose.

    Perhaps the service economy requires us all to live on top of one another, but that is good reason to examine this economic model and make changes.

    Since a service economy cannot produce growth, it has no real sustainability.