The Impossible Hamster: Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever is either a madman or an economist

I must have been six or seven years old when I started to realize that our food and cloths each year became more expensive, and I noticed that the gasoline prices at the petrol station that we passed when we walked to church most of the time were increasing. Although I tried to soothe myself with the thought that people’s salaries were increasing simultaneously so that there was no acute problem, I failed to get rid of the frightening thought that the world couldn’t go on like this forever… but no one around me seemed to share my worries…

“There is a reason why in nature things only grew in size to a certain point… so why do most economists and politicians think that the economy can grow forever and ever and ever…???”

“Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist” – Kenneth Boulding.

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