Sublime

The end goal that we’re aiming for is to reduce our impacts per person to zero – or at least very close to zero. If we’re to build a sustainable world for the future then we all have to tread with the lightest of footprints. That’s really the point of this book: to work out if and how we can do that. In a world where our per capita impacts are zero

It’s really quite straightforward. Right now, the dominant assumption in economics is that all sectors of the economy must grow, all the time, regardless of whether or not we actually need them to. This is an irrational way to manage an economy at the best of times, but during an ecological emergency it is clearly dangerous. Instead, we should

With lower-cost workers doing the same work in less time, mass unemployment, or at least underemployment, becomes more likely, and we may see the need for policy solutions, like a four-day workweek or universal basic income, that reduce the floor for human welfare.

But this era is over. Now consumers have coalesced into the powerful multitude. Their empowerment can more and more be seen as a threat for society. Just like Walmart, tech companies such as Amazon and many others prove that in the Entrepreneurial Age, a multitude hungry for quality at scale beats workers and society most of the time, inflicting a

Technology democratizes consumption but consolidates production. The best person in the world at anything gets to do it for everyone.

(This kind of scheme is currently being pioneered in Scandinavia, where governments follow the motto “Protect workers, not jobs.”)

To an increasing degree, individuals capable of creating significant economic value will be able to retain most of the value they create for themselves. Support staff that previously absorbed a large part of the revenue generated by the principal income creators in an enterprise will be replaced by low-cost automated agents and information systems.