What happens to the world if americans stop consuming the booty of the world?

-- zoobie (zoobiezoob@yahoo.com), November 26, 1999

Answers

The oceans, atmosphere, species, forests and land have a chance to recover a little?

Ohhh...you mean the people!!!

Is that all you people worry about?

Hallyx

"A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise." --- Aldo Leopold (Sand County Almanac)

"I dismiss assurances from every major organization in the world and, instead, choose to get my info through a group of characters over the internet that go by such names as "Big Dog" and "Zoobie." --- Dave (aaa)

-- (Hallyx@aol.com), November 26, 1999.

The 'answer' to that question is both simple and complex. On the simple side of that equation all one needs to do is take the percentage of national income that is spent on import goods. Take the gorss domestic products of exporting countries and strike a ratio. That whould give you some idea if you are so inclined. I am not. On the comlex side one has to look at the balance of trade and the forces of inflation and deflation that is a function of favorable and unfavorable trade balances. Now you are getting into a bucket of worms. You can figure it out though if you have nothing to do and plenty of time to

-- James W. Bryant (Alphapoint@aol.com), November 26, 1999.

Based on some economic columns I read, we have been spending ourselves broke on imports. And we've been supporting this trade imbalance by selling shares in U.S. companies, especially internet companies. We traded Amazon.com shares for cars and electronics. This year that sounds like a bad deal. Next year?

-- You Know... (notme@nothere.junk), November 27, 1999.

In short: World-Wide Economic Depression. Collapse of some weak governments...possibly all the way into anarchy. Stong governments may attempt to provoke wars in order to survive. Attempts to use machinery, etc. long past its normal life span. With less "profit" available, many entities will attempt to cut corners in order to achieve any profit. This, in turn, will negatively impact the environment. Consider just one super tanker pushed to the point that it founders...with the consequent loss of oil to the ocean environment.

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), November 29, 1999.

There no doubt, despite the irritation felt toward America, even by its friends, and the feelings, closer to despising than irritation, in other parts of the world about America, the fact that in other highly advanced industrial capitalist societies that produce the things--cars, electronics, that we consume on a large scale, appreciate our business, as do those countries who's economies are fueled in large part by the purchase of materials for production by major producing countries, including but not at all limited to America. Our business is at least useful, quite useful even, in many cases, and in a few is probably seen as vital.

However, there are certainly many contries--many that are also capitalist, industrial countries that themselves produce and consume consumer goods--who gawk and awe at the simply outlandish consumption, and even more so the outrageous culture of waste and wastefulness in America. The absolute relentlessness of the American media also does not go unnoticed, or without pleantiful mocking. The rest of the World's industrial capitalist practices would most likely sustain the World economy that would simply adjust itself for the shift in American consumption by adjusting the rates and/or modes of production and everything would eventually be just fine. This is because, again, the way we treat consumption, creating, possessing and throwing away ten minutes later in favor of the newer thing, is not the way the rest of the world necessarily behaved or wants to live anyway.

And on an even more serious note, there are definately persons in the world, if not an entire society or government then a growing number of even the moderately socially aware, who are realizing that not only would a cap on american consumerism and the almost inextractable issue of waste not ruin the world economy, but might be the most important element in saving the world's ecosystems. The United states is, in one way or another, either directly through it's actions or indirectly so, through that which it encourages around the world (case in point, current developments in China--look into it if you have not already) is largely responsible for damages sustained over the decades to the world's natural environments, from clear- cutting in the rain forsets, to emmisions into air and water ways of chemicals not only toxic, themselves, but that have contributed to the depletion the the Earth's Ozone and the resulting Global warming. The world knows that America consumes more natural resources than its share and contributes to global ecological problems with more than its share of waste produced per capita annually, and takes the least. And world leaders are frequently frustarated by these facts, coupled with America's refusal to look at these issues and commit to, along with the rest of the world, doing something about our bleak environmental future, even so far as resaerching sustainable energy sources, alternatives to fossil fuels and to methods of waste treatment that would be greener.

When really looked at closely, American consumerism hurts the world more than it really helps anything. Our contribution to the global economy is nice and certainly appreciated at times, but our values here are not the same as those in other capitalist societies that possess a little more class than we, generally speaking, do. We are not the only producers or consumers in the world, we are simply the most outrageous of each of those, and the least socially conscious and responsible. The World would undoubtedly find a way to cope with the loss of some of our "contributions," and in the long run be a healthier, safer place for it--a reality that is sensed even now to enough of a degree that little panic even would be found in the wake of America's complete disappearance from the face of the Earth.

-- Nicole Meserve (nikkimeserve@msn.com), December 22, 2002.