Prosperity without Growth: Foundations for the Economy of Tomorrow

I'm almost finished reading this up-dated version. I bought it used with someone's notes in the margins which are interesting. This is a very good read and very relevant to today. I plan on reading it a second time to let it soak in more. If you like to read and do self study, this could be a good fit for you. Maybe you are tired of working to support a consumerism that isn't really worth it. Reading something like this is better than consuming junk.

This is a special book; one for the ages. Actually, it contains vital information for the future primarily. It addresses brilliantly the central factors in modern society all over the world. It is an economic world, driven by two things; growth and money. He details how to deal with these in governing ourselves for the next several centuries.

Sadly and to our peril, the message has been largely ignored.

Definitely points to a better way for humanity to operate...

I've taken my time working my way through this book because A) the topic is fascinating, B) vital, and C) each of the 11 chapters is dense with ideas. The key word is Prosperity.Tim Jackson has updated what began as the fruit of a government-sponsored investigation seven years ago into what shape a modern economy might be molded into, in recognition of constraints that are becoming clearer every day - sustainable development in other words. The book is heavily sourced and draws on many different disciplines. Jackson has used the lessons learned during the interval to examine the original premises of the book and draw some new conclusions about them.To put it bluntly, the world can not continue with an economic model that is dependent on ever increasing consumption and novelty to drive the growth needed to keep it running. There are resource limits we are already bumping against, there are the problems of inequality, stability, the proper role of government and markets, and at the core, human expectations. We can not continue as we are, but we cannot simply overthrow the current order either. It is going to take an investment in changing things towards goals we can sustain and, just as important, an adjustment in what we understand to mean by prosperity.It's not simply a matter of achieving happiness through material goods, the raison d'etre of consumerism. Prosperity, as Jackson envisions it, needs to incorporate more than just that, because consumerism is based on growth. Jackson gets into detail on what prosperity needs to become in chapter three. He discusses how hard it is going to be to 'decouple' it from growth, escaping the iron cage of consumerism, finding ways to flourish within limits, all the while developing a new system of economics around the principles he identifies.This book is going to draw a lot of fire from the usual suspects on ideological grounds if nothing else. Jackson argues that the capitalism we have today is not the capitalism we need for tomorrow, and looks to government playing a vital role in the process of restructuring our world. Simply citing GDP numbers leaves out a lot of important considerations, as Jackson explains.I expect to put a lot more study into this book. There's a lot to sift through. We can't continue as we are going without serious consequences. Climate change is just one of many.For those who want more to consider, "The Spirit Level" by Wilkinson and Pickett (available through Amazon) provides much food for thought.

I began my reading of this book as someone who espoused a libertarian perspective.Since my first reading of the text I have spent a long time thinking through the arguments put forward within it and my responses to them. Along the way I came to a conclusion that something was not quite right about either.What Jackson presents us with is a very plausible argument about the problems that the world faces and some possible solutions. Although some of the material is a little difficult most of the content is understandable to most readers and he writes in a reader friendly, almost thriller fashion (no offence) which carries the reader forward at a speed which allows understanding.In my humble opinion, the problem is that the analysis misses the point. It talks about capitalism and wants an active governmental set of solutions but I would humbly suggest that further study be made of the nature of the capitalism which is made the villain of the piece.I no longer recognise the capitalism which holds sway in the United States and continues to advance its grip on a global level in the face of a Chinese version having much of the same effects. In my view it is this version, unchallenged by a strong anti-competitive apparatus which rides roughshod over the world's finite resources, chewing them up and spitting them out like some monstrous machines with impunity. Governments are bought and sold as the rise of professional politicians replaced more independent self made people.Responses to the global problems are discussed by civil servants who may mean well but who represent governments who are begging and bribing at the tables of mega corporations to try and get them to locate their factories in their country or their state to provide jobs.This is the dilemma. Corporations too big and too powerful who can switch production between counties easily and quickly, no effective regulation of them, little or no coordination between nations and well funded apologists in business, public relations, education and so called think tanks to spread their propaganda.Keeping workers busy and having to work as much as possible while encouraging an education system which is more vocational than encouraging thinking are strategies which force ordinary people to concentrate on merely existing rather than looking at other issues are tried and tested methods of keeping resistance down.This is the dilemma. Recognising the problem is one thing, finding solutions is a greater issue altogether.#TimJackson

Prepare for a longish read - Jackson's style is very wordy.He proposes that prosperity is rather more than having a lot of stuff. Indefinite growth - ever more stuff - is clearly not sustainable on a finite planet, but our current economic system is not stable in the absence of growth - it's either boom or bust. He proposes a different set of priorities that could lead to a new kind of prosperity. This new idea is not aligned with the current positions of either of the two main UK parties, but neither is it completely incompatible with some of their ideas.Gordon Brown did not like it, Prince Charles does - make up your own mind!

This IS essential reading. The value of Tim Jackson’s ideas has been covered by other reviewers, but another great service provided by this book is that is gives a clear, simple and accessible explanation of the economic approaches required to face the inevitable changes approaching us. In this it constitutes an invaluable addition to the current popular literature on climate and social justice, which tend to get a bit nervous when it comes to economic analysis. There is no doubt that the environmental, social and political status quo will change irrevocably over the next 20 to 30 years. Also in no doubt is that our politicians will face this change with a “more of the same, but even more desperately” outlook (re: any policy suggested by Trump since inauguration), and continue to arrogantly wave our concerns away with the implication that economics are beyond the everyday citizen. They, and news providers and media commentators, need to realise that we are not in Kansas anymore (in fact probably nobody will be in 30 years time) – it’s time to grow up. Jackson provides us with the ammunition to at least understand the options upon which to base our demands for reasoned and responsible change.

A very good book. Should be compulsory reading.

A great book. Good at documenting how our current economy is wrong and the half-measure deployed after the crash of 2008. Also help explains the link between economic growth and climate change in a way many on the left should do, but regrettably don't.

Compelling arguments in favour of pursuing prosperity in ways that do not rely on excessive consumeristic livestyles, but skips through the economics theory in a too rushed way for my taste

An essential message, for above all, the developed world , still very relevant.

Lets try busting the idea that growth is always good!

This is a great book and the first book review I have ever written on Amazon. Over the last 10 years I have read many books on peak oil, cradle to grave, climate change,... But this is the first book I've found that examines the economic system we have in a balanced way to build understanding and proposes potential options for addressing the fundamental challenges ahead in our finite world. Not finished yet, on chapter 7, but this is great!

Wie der Titel sagt, fehlen mir die Lösungsansätze. Das Problem wird aber detailliert und gut beschrieben.

Good book. Decent paper quality.

Excepcional libro por la forma en que aborda el problema del consumo como motor económico en relación con los recursos finitos del planeta.

A confronting and inspiring book that succeeds well in opening the (middle) way to go from our growth-based consumer economy to a more stable and sustainable economy that accounts better for human needs and values. It dares to address and even answer some of the difficult questions of society while keeping a rational point of view that does not fall into (overly green or liberal) extremes. I can highly recommend reading this book.

A very significant read. All options need considering and this option is gaining ground.

The usual 95% critique, a little bit of 'that MUST change' and a few tantalising glimpses of what might be done. Cleverly done with references to all the usual good guys and gals.But where's the beef? What's to be done? BY What means will we change.If only the Author had given one concrete thing that could be done, and then show why this will steer us toward a better life (which happens to create a smaller carbon footprint)The Author has achieved excellent elite endorsements. Is that why this book is such unproductive waffle?

The argument here is so tired, repetitious and seen-it-all-before it should be on DAVE.Once again we are, one and all, going to hell on a supermarket trolley, in thrall to compulsive and deeply unsatisfying consumerism. The West should thus stop encouraging or celebrating macro-economic growth on the grounds that "subsistence needs are largely met" amid a "cornucopia of consumer goods", the progressive devouring of which makes us unfulfilled and unhappy. (This might come as a surprise to those households living on the national UK average income of ca. £26,000 per annum. But hey ho.).Those familiar with this particular strand of social moralising will find all the usual suspects on display : Wilkinson-Pickett, Schor, Layard, the Dalai Lama, Monbiot, Townsend, Easterlin, Inglehart and of course Robert Putnam who was responsible for that most dreary and nonsensical tract "Bowling Alone", still doing serious damage to social analysis all these years after it first saw the light. Tim Jackson says that "success today is synonymous with material affluence" - a shallow, stupid line that could have been pronounced by any 1950s English vicar or American preacher - and that we are all too busy trying to keep up with the Joneses (sic) to lead lives of true virtue and humanity. More, " a sense of anxiety pervades modern society..." alongside "a widespread disenchantment with modern life". Pure Billy Graham. (No wonder Rowan Williams has endorsed the book). People are just so miserable these days that they will surely realise it eventually and turn away from the really unfulfilling business of wanting nicer things in the shops, eating better food, wearing better kit.It's all so patronising you could screech.Global economic growth in 2017 is unlikely to stretch beyond 5%. This is so low that it means millions across the world will not be lifted up further towards better (often just decent) living conditions. Meanwhile, the USA is not morally rotting because of overflowing mall-carts but she is badly disfigured by the most pervasive and indeed pernicious income stagnation, a major contributor to political malaise. Tim Jackson should want global GDP growth to be over 10% in 2017. The alternative is either stalled living standards in the West and continued absolute poverty in Africa.The prescriptions on offer here are not merely pseudo-spiritual they are in their potential practical effect damaging to the citizenry and the services on which they depend. The biggest consumer of all is, after all, the state - which needs to be financed and re-financed via economic growth. Inequality, in this very setting, is not the primary problem of our time; the troubled search for employment- and income-bearing growth most emphatically is.According to the blurb, no less a figure than Yanis Varoufakis describes this book as "essential reading".Well, he would know, wouldn't he?