Greetings,
Please enter the following into your computations; these are not subject to
dispute except for "rounding errors".
Approximately 1/4 million humans are added to the population DAILY. That is the
net amount that births exceed deaths. The "pie" that is divided, whether
sustainable or not, is therefor, on average, yielding a smaller slice/human.
Unless, of course, that one claims that the "pie" is increasing in size. Last I
heard, the planet was not expanding.
This is independent of the impact that the consumption of the pie has upon it's
future size, on the natural production upon which life depends. All the tokens
in the world cannot increase natural production.
To argue over policies of distribution without being concerned with the size of
the pie, it's renewability, and the # of sharers is to my mind nonsensical.
Cheers,
Steve Kurtz
> But does it improve the SoL for the less well off individuals in those less
> well off countries?
>
> > Richer countries may have to "pay" for their lesser well off neighbours but
> > our standard of living on average is much higher.
> > Is part of the "problem" with globalization, that Western nations will have
> > to take a pay cut! (( washes mouth out with soap and water )) ;-)
>
> Tony's claim touches the key issues:
>
> 1. Must globalization increase the overall pie?
>
> This is the gain that the mathematical models do predict unambiguously for
> (idealized) free trade - that the total economic product is maximized.
>
> Some folks claim that the gain would be adequate to keep any piece from
> shrinking.
>
> 2. (If so,) must increasing the overall pie increase particular pieces? For
> example, the smaller ones?
>
> This is more problematic, even mathematically. The relevent theory is that of
> 'Comparative Advantage', which argues for specialization. Unfortunately it
> appears that the particular specializations must be able (even eager) to
> easily change over time, something that seems rather difficult to pull off in
> practice.
>
> 3. (How) does increasing the size of a piece affect the distribution of that
> piece
