Change is coming: Are You Ready?

International Panelists Agree: growth does not equal happiness. Economic experts Tim Jackson, head of an advisory body for the British government, Robert Costanza professor at the University of Vermont and Peter Victor, Professor at York University in Toronto came together today in an international podcast that challenged the western concepts of growth, progress, and quality of life.

Key points included...

1. The current economic system cannot be sustained. Change is necessary to ensure our continued survival within the planet's ecological limits.

2. Modern economies must stop growing in the commonly accepted sense of the term.

3. The Western world is at a point where increased consumption does not lead to increased quality of life.

4. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) does not measure quality of life. It measures financial data in the absence of other factors that influence personal happiness and fulfillment, and as such is an ineffective as an indicator of progress.

5. Growth/Progress should be measured not by GDP, but rather by a group of indicators:
a) Ecological capital (the environment's ability to provide us with services, resources etc.)
b) Social capital (our ability to provide health care, social safety net, etc.)
c) Human capital (full employment, rewarding work)
d) Built capital (efficient energy systems, buildings, cars, etc.)

Pretty heady stuff, but the concept appears to be catching on. Even French President Sarkozy has publicly commented that economies cannot grow continuously.

If the one-hour panel can be reduced to a single message, it is that inevitable change is coming - perhaps not as soon as some of us would like - but that the people, businesses, NGO's and governments that prepare now will survive the change much better than those that wait. What are you doing to prepare?