Suchergebnisse

Cover -- Half Title -- Dedication -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Table of Contents -- List of Figures -- List of Tables -- Acknowledgments -- List of Abbreviations -- 1: Sustainable Development: An Introduction -- 2: The Political Economy of Growth and Deforestation in Brazil -- 3: Measuring Sustainable Development: Definitional Issues and Competing Perspectives -- 4: Green Income Accounting: The Commodity Value of Natural Resources -- 5: Green Income Accounting: The Conservation Value of Natural Resources -- 6: Sustainable Development Reassessment: Application of the Distribution Weights Framework -- 7: Conclusion: Requiem for GDP? -- Appendices -- Bibliography -- Index.

We have finally reached the point where most people around the world believe that climate change is really happening. Almost a decade ago, the landmark report by Nicholas Stern sparked a fierce debate among economists, not over whether climate change was real, but over the costs of addressing it. In the years since, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has published further alarming reports on projected future global temperatures, rates of glacial melting, and sea levels. Most recently, last December saw an unprecedented agreement by nearly 200 countries at the Paris climate summit to take steps to address the problem.… My concern here is therefore not to continue making the case for the reality of climate change, but instead to show how that reality is portrayed—and distorted—in the mainstream media, with behind-the-scenes assistance from orthodox economic analysis.Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the Monthly Review website.

El crecimiento del producto interno bruto (PIB) como indicador de adelanto social ha sido criticado como engañoso pues pasa por alto las consecuencias ambientales y sociales de una economía creciente. En este trabajo desarrollo un indicador alternativo que no sólo toma en cuenta estos dos aspectos, sino además cómo los problemas ambientales están distribuidos dentro de la población. Aplico mi metodología a datos sobre Brasil de 1965 a 1998 y encuentro que, a pesar de un crecimiento anual más alla de 3% en el PIB, el bienestar nacional aumenta mucho más lentamente o, incluso, disminuye. Los resultados refuerzan las dudas sobre el PIB y demuestran la importancia de la distribución ecológica en relación con el bienestar nacional de un país.

Accounting for environmental damage is relevant to how one measures
the extent and severity of inequality and poverty, and the question
of ecological distribution - how the costs associated with environmental
damage are distributed across the population - is critical. Following
Khan's (1997) study on Bangladesh, I use environmental damage
estimates to adjust inequality and poverty measures for Brazil and
Costa Rica. Unlike Khan, I test for different assumptions regarding
the ecological distribution. Provisional results indicate that inequality
and poverty are understated, and that, under certain assumptions, both
worsened in Costa Rica during the 1980s, contrary to what conventional
statistics suggest. Want of reliable ecological distribution data,
however, suggests that sensitivity analysis around competing assumptions
may be preferable to conventional indicators.

Objective.The article corrects for two main shortcomings in conventional economic analyses of environmental change. First is the overemphasis placed on income growth, and general disregard for other socioeconomic factors. Second is economists' often oversimplified view of the environment, where distinctions between environmental necessities such as potable water and so‐called environmental luxuries are ignored. I test for the effectiveness of power inequality in explaining access to sanitation and safe water as well as their health consequences.Methods.I develop a two‐stage model seeking first to explain changes in the environmental variables and then population health. I employ ordinary least squares regressions on international cross‐sectional data.Results.Some dimensions of power inequality outperform per‐capita income as possible determinants of population health. Neither power inequality nor income is clearly superior at explaining environmental quality.Conclusion. The study casts further doubt on the importance of per‐capita income in explaining environmental and health outcomes.

Objective. The article corrects for two main shortcomings in conventional economic analyses of environmental change. First is the overemphasis placed on income growth, & general disregard for other socioeconomic factors. Second is economists' often oversimplified view of the environment, where distinctions between environmental necessities such as potable water & so-called environmental luxuries are ignored. I test for the effectiveness of power inequality in explaining access to sanitation & safe water as well as their health consequences. Methods. I develop a two-stage model seeking first to explain changes in the environmental variables & then population health. I employ ordinary least squares regressions on international cross-sectional data. Results. Some dimensions of power inequality outperform per-capita income as possible determinants of population health. Neither power inequality nor income is clearly superior at explaining environmental quality. Conclusion. The study casts further doubt on the importance of per-capita income in explaining environmental & health outcomes. Tables, Figures, Appendixes, References. Adapted from the source document.