Maybe I am dumb .. Archived Message Posted by Shyaku on February 14, 2019, 1:50 pm, in reply to "Can public, non-commercial banks - which I very much support - negate the effects of the" Negate, no. Mitigate, yes. - Roughly representing the difference between nihilism and a struggle for survival. The aim of a green new deal isn't to extract energy and metals, its to invest in aternatives. I am no expert at all in this, but lets take just a single example: If everything that was manufactured was designed with a complete and effective disassembly pathway back to its basic components, and this pathway was rigorously enforced, half the workforce would be disassembling stuff. That would maybe either double the number of jobs in an instant, or halve the production rate to meet the new, higher labor costs in production plus disassembly. Manufactuered goods may double in price as a result, but their intrinsic value could also be doubled by halving the obsolescence rate, and anyway, the concept of personal property could be mitigated with greater amount of shared/public property or a flatter income distribution. Moreover, recycled parts would be cheaper. Just in new homes alone, the demand for new materials could be hugely lower? I know nothing, but it seems to me that in one step you have multiplied recycling many-fold, slowed the wasteful frenetic pace of everything-upgrade, redistributed labor from pointless activity like endless construction and reconstruction of useless offices and malls to recycling, flattened out some inequality, brought into question the wasteful repetition of some aspects of personal property. Now add to that a public transportation system that actually works for the majority of people instead of the automobile, and enforcement of a 1-child policy for a single generation, and greater emphasis on public health and preventive care. Feel free to call me stupid, but it seems pretty easily doable. The only issue seems to be making people do it. And that is the huge issue. To me, green new deal doesn't mean manufacturing millions of solar panels and windmills and then paying people to stick them up everywhere then carrying on as now until everything just runs up against the wall anyway: It means trying to do a few basic mundane things like disassembling everything, public transportation, making things that really last, preserving health and trying to halve the world's population in a generation. Its really, really dull compared to the glitzy world we have now, its kinda like living in Cuba :-) but its better than death, and it doesn't destroy the possibility of technological advancement and a new, more efficient, cleaner, more harmonious golden age to follow. - Shyaku. Message Thread: Guardian article on AOC s Green Deal - Edgar G Ulmer February 12, 2019, 10:14 pm Reconstruction Finance Corporation - mike February 12, 2019, 10:34 pm Can public, non-commercial banks - which I very much support - negate the effects of the - Rhisiart Gwilym February 13, 2019, 8:00 am Maybe I am dumb .. - Shyaku February 14, 2019, 1:50 pm Obviously I agree with all that, Shy. But - er - you still need energy, metals, etc. to do it. Even - Rhisiart Gwilym February 15, 2019, 6:32 pm A better Guardian article on AOC s Green Deal - Edgar G February 13, 2019, 8:51 pm   Searching