IMPLICATIONS OF GLOBAL WARMING

Up to the present there are close correlations of economic growth with carbon dioxide emissions across nations, although there is also a considerable divergence in carbon intensity (carbon emissions per GDP). The Stern Review notes that the prediction that, "Under business as usual, global emissions will be sufficient to propel greenhouse gas concentrations to over 550ppm CO₂e by 2050 and over 650–700ppm by the end of this century is robust to a wide range of changes in model assumptions." The scientific consensus is that planetary ecosystem functioning without incurring dangerous risks requires stabilization at 450–550 ppm.

As a consequence, growth-oriented environmental economists propose massive government intervention into switching sources of energy production, favoring wind, solar, hydroelectric, and nuclear. This would largely confine use of fossil fuels to either domestic cooking needs (such as for kerosene burners) or where carbon capture and storage technology can be cost-effective and reliable. The Stern Review, published by the United Kingdom Government in 2006, concluded that an investment of 1% of GDP (later changed to 2%) would be sufficient to avoid the worst effects of climate change, and that failure to do so could risk climate-related costs equal to 20% of GDP. Because carbon capture and storage is as yet widely unproven, and its long term effectiveness (such as in containing carbon dioxide 'leaks') unknown, and because of current costs of alternative fuels, these policy responses largely rest on faith of technological change.

On the other hand, Nigel Lawson claimed that people in a hundred years' time would be "seven times as well off as we are today"; therefore it is not reasonable to impose sacrifices on the "much poorer present generation".

EQUITABLE GROWTH

While acknowledging the central role economic growth can potentially play in human development, poverty reduction and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, it is becoming widely understood amongst the development community that special efforts must be made to ensure poorer sections of society are able to participate in economic growth. The effect of economic growth on poverty reduction - the Growth elasticity of poverty - can depend on the existing level of inequality. For instance, with low inequality a country with a growth rate of 2% per head and 40% of its population living in poverty, can halve poverty in ten years, but a country with high inequality would take nearly 60 years to achieve the same reduction. In the words of the Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-Moon:

While economic growth is necessary, it is not sufficient for progress on reducing poverty.

The Overseas Development Institute emphasizes the need to ensure social protection is extended to allow universal access and that policies are introduced to encourage the private sector to create new jobs as the economy grows (as opposed to jobless growth) and seek to employ people from disadvantaged groups. 

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT

Critics such as the Club of Rome argue that a narrow view of economic growth, combined with globalization, is creating a scenario where we could see a systemic collapse of our planet's natural resources.

Concerns about possible negative effects of growth on the environment and society led some to advocate lower levels of growth. This led to the ideas of uneconomic growth and de-growth – and Green parties that argue that economies are part of a global society and global ecology, and cannot outstrip their natural growth without damaging those.

Those more optimistic about the environmental impacts of growth believe that, though localized environmental effects may occur, large-scale ecological effects are minor. The argument, as stated by commentator Julian Lincoln Simon, states that if these global-scale ecological effects exist, human ingenuity will find ways to adapt to them. 

RESOURCE DEPLETION

Many earlier predictions of resource depletion, such as Thomas Malthus' 1798 predictions about approaching famines in Europe, The Population Bomb (1968), Limits to Growth (1972), and the Simon–Ehrlich wager (1980) did not materialize, nor has diminished production of most resources occurred so far, one reason being that advancements in technology and science have allowed some previously unavailable resources to be produced. In some cases, substitution of more abundant materials, such as plastics for cast metals, lowered growth of usage for some metals. In the case of the limited resource of land, famine was relieved firstly by the revolution in transportation caused by railroads and steam ships, and later by the Green Revolution and chemical fertilizers, especially the Haber process for ammonia synthesis.

In the case of minerals, lower grades of mineral resources are being extracted, requiring higher inputs of capital and energy for both extraction and processing. An example is natural gas from shale and other low permeability rock, which can be developed with much higher inputs of energy, capital, and materials than conventional gas in previous decades. Another example is offshore oil and gas, which has exponentially increasing cost as water depth increases.

Some Malthusians, such as William R. Catton, Jr., author of the 1980 book Overshoot, are skeptical of various technological advancements that make previously inaccessible or lower grade resources more available. The counter-argument is that such advances and increases in efficiency merely accelerate the drawing down of finite resources. Catton refers to the contemporary increases in rates of resource extraction as, "...stealing ravenously from the future." The apparent and temporary "increase" of resource extraction with the use of new technology leads to the popular perception that resources are infinite or can be substituted without limit, but this perception fails to consider that ultimately, even lower quality resources are finite and become uneconomic to extract when the ore quality is too low.

NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF ECONOMIC GROWTH

A number of arguments have been raised against economic growth.

It may be that economic growth improves the quality of life up to a point, after which it doesn't improve the quality of life, but rather obstructs sustainable living.

:)