The Downside of a Constant Growth Strategy

The downside of a constant growth strategy, Hickel says, is that it inevitably pushes up against what scientists call planetary boundaries. If we were to consume at the rates of the average person in high income nations, "we would be overshooting planetary boundaries by a factor of four or five," he says. Capitalism constantly produces efficiency improvements but there has not been an absolute decline in resource and energy use - long-term decoupling hasn't happened.