MedusasSexyLegHair t1_itscboe wrote on October 25, 2022 at 11:04 PM

Reply to comment by Twin_Spoons in Eli5: I don't understand why there seems to be a general consensus that gdp will continue a trend of growth, and why this would be beneficial, considering the cyclical nature of economies and empires rising and falling. Isn't economic downturn on some level unavoidable or even beneficial? by candymannequin

One example of where a drop in GDP might increase standard of living would be if we actually used our science and technology to build lasting, durable, repairable things, instead of fast fashion trends and planned obsolescence.

Also if we were to focus more on renewables instead of single-use consumables.

A third might be developing efficient localized production rather than using inefficient long-distance shipping (but that's more difficult since currently it's much easier to produce things efficiently at certain locations and ship them, than to develop efficient localized production).

In such cases, we could produce less, and work less, overall (lower GDP) and yet still have more and live better. That's kind of a path to post-scarcity economy.

But until then, GDP growth is still preferable. Given how consumption-oriented society currently is, a drop in growth or worse a decrease, leads to lower standards of living and unnecessary increases in scarcity.

ReneDeGames t1_itsri8j wrote on October 26, 2022 at 12:59 AM

Long lasting isn't necessarily useful in a fast development environment, computers have roughly doubled in power to cost ever 2 years for decades now, its cheaper in all ways to keep building new computers rather than makes ones that will last.

MedusasSexyLegHair t1_itsz3s3 wrote on October 26, 2022 at 1:57 AM

To some degree. I remember the hot days of the early '90s, when your computer was certainly obsolete by the time you got it home from the store. And each new development opened up new possibilities (multimedia! networking! etc.)

But we're way past the point of diminishing returns on utility there quite awhile back. For typical use - write an email, view a PDF, maybe use a word processor to write an essay or a spreadsheet to calculate your credit card debt - a 98-era computer could do all of that just fine. We don't need 64GB of RAM and a 3.20GHz processor for that. Mostly we only need more speed and space because the software has become so bloated and inefficient - because it can, due to the hardware.

However, as a gamer, new systems are cool. That's why in 2016, I retired my decade-old 2006 PC and built a new one. Six years later, I upgraded the graphics card and added a new M2 SSD for more speed. AAA games run great and the CPU and RAM never come near getting stressed, either from games or my (sometimes sloppy) programming projects and data migrations. I don't foresee any need to upgrade for another 6 years. And I'm a hardcore/heavy user. An average person could probably get 20+ years out of a computer if the software bloat didn't kill it.

Similarly, my new smartphone works about the same as the one I bought in 2013. Sure it has higher specs on paper, but messaging someone on it, or getting directions from Google Maps, is no different than it was back then.

But other things I was thinking about were things like appliances and furniture and stuff. A lot of that stuff used to last a lifetime and pass down to your heirs. Even with electronics, once upon a time, you'd call in a radio repairman if your radio broke down but that'd be ridiculous now since you could buy a new one for the fraction of the price of a repair or upgrade. But why not make it to last? Is radio tech really changing that quickly?