The Limits of Growth, Water Edition

Ever faster growth will lead to depletion of scarce resources. That statement makes sense until you realize that the Earth has essentially the same number (and type) of atoms today that existed in 5000 B.C. What has changed?

Think of economic growth as a mere symptom of re-arranging atoms.

But won't we deplate resources? Not really, since most resources can be re-used again and again. I mean, where did your teeth come from? Economists make this distinction between stocks and flows. And in the long run, we're all flows.

This mid-day meandering was brought to you by the provocative author of aquanomics, David Zetland, thanks to his article on the water shortage myth at Forbes.com. (HT: marginal revolution)

Comments

[Charles Johnson]

The late, great Julian L. Simon once wrote a book with Stephen Moore entitled, "It's Getting Better All the Time: 100 Greatest Trends of the Last 100 Years" in which he noted that our rivers, lakes, and streams have only gotten more and more clean as time goes on. Take just this statistic. "In 1994, 86 percent of U.S. rivers and streams were usable for fishing and swimming as were 91 percent of U.S. lakes, up from 36 percent in 1972."

Of course, like water, there are so many things that the state runs that entrepreneurs could run more efficiently, like the Austrian school talked about way back in the day.

Don't like mass extinction of tigers? Farm tigers. Don't like mass fishing? Develop property rights on the ocean. Don't like smog pollution? Develop a market that trades in the externalities like they did in California? You get the point. Pity govt. doesn't.