Benefits
The benefits of a steady state economy can be grouped in three categories: environmental, lifestyle, and moral. Environmental benefits stem from the establishment of a steady state economy at a sustainable scale. An economy with stable population and consumption features decreased liquidation of natural resources and less waste deposition in the environment. Such an economy that respects biophysical limits does not excessively disrupt natural ecosystems and ecosystem services. It is sized to balance with nature and protect the life-giving resources and processes of the planet.
The lifestyle benefits of a steady state economy are numerous. Life is downshifted as overconsumption, congestion, sprawl, and unfair trade practices fade away. Efficiency is still valued, but the tasks for which we seek maximum efficiency are more carefully considered. People have more time and inclination to focus on community, relationships, sufficient consumption, and other important life matters.
Establishment of a steady state economy also can provide significant moral benefits. First, on a planetary scale, limiting growth in nations that enjoy high levels of per capita consumption would leave more room for economic growth in those nations where citizens are getting by on low levels of consumption. In the long run, preventing over-consumption in the present leaves greater opportunities for future generations to meet their needs. Finally, limiting growth can lower the percentage of planetary resources appropriated to human economies, resulting in more room for nature and continued evolution of ecosystems and species.
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Famous quotes containing the word benefits:
“It is with benefits as with injuries in this respect, that we do not so much weigh the accidental good or evil they do us, as that which they were designed to do us.—That is, we consider no part of them so much as their intention.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“It is too late in the century for women who have received the benefits of co-education in schools and colleges, and who bear their full share in the world’s work, not to care who make the laws, who expound and who administer them.”
—J. Ellen Foster (1840–1910)
“I do seriously believe that if we can measure among the States the benefits resulting from the preservation of the Union, the rebellious States have the larger share. It destroyed an institution that was their destruction. It opened the way for a commercial life that, if they will only embrace it and face the light, means to them a development that shall rival the best attainments of the greatest of our States.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)