The Simon–Ehrlich wager was a 1980 scientific wager between business professor Julian Simon and biologist Paul Ehrlich, betting on a mutually agreed-upon measure of resource scarcity over the decade leading up to 1990. The widely followed contest originated in the pages of Social Science Quarterly, where Simon challenged Ehrlich to put his money where his mouth was. In response to Ehrlich's published claim that "If I were a gambler, I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000" Simon offered to take that bet, or, more realistically, "to stake US$10,000... on my belief that the cost of non-government-controlled raw materials will not rise in the long run."
In economics, stagflation is a situation in which the inflation rate is high or increasing, the economic growth rate slows, and unemployment remains steadily high. Stagflation, once thought impossible, poses a dilemma for economic policy, as measures to reduce inflation may exacerbate unemployment.
The Population Bomb is a 1968 book co-authored by former Stanford University professor Paul R. Ehrlich and former Stanford senior researcher in conservation biology Anne H. Ehrlich. From the opening page, it predicted worldwide famines due to overpopulation, as well as other major societal upheavals, and advocated immediate action to limit population growth. Fears of a "population explosion" existed in the mid-20th century baby boom years, but the book and its authors brought the idea to an even wider audience.
The Limits to Growth (LTG) is a 1972 report that discussed the possibility of exponential economic and population growth with finite supply of resources, studied by computer simulation. The study used the World3 computer model to simulate the consequence of interactions between the Earth and human systems. The model was based on the work of Jay Forrester of MIT, as described in his book World Dynamics.
Julian Lincoln Simon was an American economist. He was a professor of economics and business administration at the University of Illinois from 1963 to 1983 before later moving to the University of Maryland, where he taught for the remainder of his academic career.
Paul Ralph Ehrlich is an American biologist known for his predictions and warnings about the consequences of population growth, including famine and resource depletion. Ehrlich is the Bing Professor Emeritus of Population Studies of the Department of Biology of Stanford University.
Liebig's law of the minimum, often simply called Liebig's law or the law of the minimum, is a principle developed in agricultural science by Carl Sprengel (1840) and later popularized by Justus von Liebig. It states that growth is dictated not by total resources available, but by the scarcest resource. The law has also been applied to biological populations and ecosystem models for factors such as sunlight or mineral nutrients.
Cornucopianism is the idea that continued supply of the material needs of humankind can be achieved through continued advances in technology. It contends that there is enough matter and energy available for practically unlimited growth.
A scientific wager is a wager whose outcome is settled by experiment or observation, following the scientific method. It typically comprises a commitment to pay out when a currently-unknown or uncertain statement is resolved, and either proven or disproved. Some wagers have specific date restrictions for collection, but many are open. Wagers occasionally exert a powerful galvanizing effect on society and the scientific community.
Artificial scarcity is scarcity of items despite the technology for production or the sufficient capacity for sharing. The most common causes are monopoly pricing structures, such as those enabled by laws that restrict competition or by high fixed costs in a particular marketplace. The inefficiency associated with artificial scarcity is formally known as a deadweight loss.
Malthusianism is a theory that population growth is potentially exponential, according to the Malthusian growth model, while the growth of the food supply or other resources is linear, which eventually reduces living standards to the point of triggering a population decline. This event, called a Malthusian catastrophe has been predicted to occur if population growth outpaces agricultural production, thereby causing famine or war. According to this theory, poverty and inequality will increase as the price of assets and scarce commodities goes up due to fierce competition for these dwindling resources. This increased level of poverty eventually causes depopulation by decreasing birth rates. If asset prices keep increasing, social unrest would occur, which would likely cause a major war, revolution, or a famine. Societal collapse is an extreme but possible outcome from this process. The theory posits that such a catastrophe would force the population to "correct" back to a lower, more easily sustainable level. Malthusianism has been linked to a variety of political and social movements, but almost always refers to advocates of population control.
Human overpopulation is the idea that human populations may become too large to be sustained by their environment or resources in the long term. The topic is usually discussed in the context of world population, though it may concern individual nations, regions, and cities.
Green accounting is a type of accounting that attempts to factor environmental costs into the financial results of operations. It has been argued that gross domestic product ignores the environment and therefore policymakers need a revised model that incorporates green accounting. The major purpose of green accounting is to help businesses understand and manage the potential quid pro quo between traditional economics goals and environmental goals. It also increases the important information available for analyzing policy issues, especially when those vital pieces of information are often overlooked. Green accounting is said to only ensure weak sustainability, which should be considered as a step toward ultimately a strong sustainability.
The Simmons–Tierney bet was a wager made in August 2005 between Houston banking executive Matthew R. Simmons and New York Times columnist John Tierney. The stakes of the bet were US$10,000.00. The subject of the bet was the year-end average of the daily price-per-barrel of crude oil for the entire calendar year of 2010 adjusted for inflation, which Simmons predicted to be at least $200. The bet was to be settled on January 1, 2011.
In economics, scarcity "refers to the basic fact of life that there exists only a finite amount of human and nonhuman resources which the best technical knowledge is capable of using to produce only limited maximum amounts of each economic good." If the conditions of scarcity did not exist and an "infinite amount of every good could be produced or human wants fully satisfied ... there would be no economic goods, i.e. goods that are relatively scarce..." Scarcity is the limited availability of a commodity, which may be in demand in the market or by the commons. Scarcity also includes an individual's lack of resources to buy commodities. The opposite of scarcity is abundance. Scarcity plays a key role in economic theory, and it is essential for a "proper definition of economics itself".
"The best example is perhaps Walras' definition of social wealth, i.e., economic goods. 'By social wealth', says Walras, 'I mean all things, material or immaterial, that are scarce, that is to say, on the one hand, useful to us and, on the other hand, only available to us in limited quantity'."
Natural resource economics deals with the supply, demand, and allocation of the Earth's natural resources. One main objective of natural resource economics is to better understand the role of natural resources in the economy in order to develop more sustainable methods of managing those resources to ensure their availability for future generations. Resource economists study interactions between economic and natural systems, with the goal of developing a sustainable and efficient economy.
Peak minerals marks the point in time when the largest production of a mineral will occur in an area, with production declining in subsequent years. While most mineral resources will not be exhausted in the near future, global extraction and production has become more challenging. Miners have found ways over time to extract deeper and lower grade ores with lower production costs. More than anything else, declining average ore grades are indicative of ongoing technological shifts that have enabled inclusion of more 'complex' processing – in social and environmental terms as well as economic – and structural changes in the minerals exploration industry and these have been accompanied by significant increases in identified Mineral Reserves.
The Pooley-Tupy theorem is an economics theorem which measures the growth in knowledge resources over time at individual and population levels.
Gale L. Pooley is an American economist, professor, and author, recognized for his work in economics and real estate valuation. Dr. Gale Pooley is currently a professor of economic history at Utah Tech University. He previously held a position as Associate Professor at Brigham Young University–Hawaii (BYU-Hawaii), where he taught in the Department of Business and Government as the lead for the economics program. His academic career also includes teaching positions at Alfaisal University in Riyadh, Brigham Young University–Idaho, Boise State University, and the College of Idaho, in the fields of business, statistics, and economics. Pooley holds professional designations from the Appraisal Institute, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, and the CCIM Institute. Pooley is renowned for his contributions to the field of economics, particularly through his work on the concept of abundance and population growth.
Marian L. Tupy is a Czechoslovak-born researcher and writer specializing in globalization, global well-being, and the politics and economics of Europe and Southern Africa. He is the editor of HumanProgress.org and a senior fellow at the Cato Institute's Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity. Tupy is known for his contributions to discussions on population growth and resource abundance.
