Can we achieve growth & equality while kicking Climate Change?

[pampango]

59. It's not the size of our economy, it's our income distribution that's the problem.

With US per capita income at $49,600 it would be easy to increase our standard of living without growing the economy or producing more CO2 if we distributed our income on a more equitable basis.

German per capita income is $43,700; France's $45,500; for the European Union as a whole it is $35,100. Most of us would figure that their standard of living is better than ours because of the safety net and public services that they have.

With respect to pollution, Europe has much more stringent pollution controls than the US so Germany produces much less CO2 with its $43,000 or France with its $45,000 than we do with our $49,000.

Our $49,600 could stay the same for decades and our 99% would still enjoy an increasing standard of living if we gradually improved our income distribution. Of course such stability in the overall economy (or an effective effort to reduce our CO2 emissions) would not benefit our 1% (who depend on an ever-growing economy) so it is not likely to happen.