Invisible Hand or Ecological Footprint? Comparing Social Versus Environmental Impacts of Recent Economic Growth

Abstract

This study examines changes in some key indicators among 66 countries on six continents over a 56-year period, to compare the power of economic growth to improve human health and income distribution with its tendency to degrade the natural environment. The results indicate that growth depletes and pollutes nature far more than it benefits society. This suggests that public policy should shift toward enhancement of individual and social well-being in ways more direct and effective, and less ecologically damaging, than reliance on overall growth in gross domestic product. I illustrate this implication with a degrowth scenario for the United States to 2050 that draws on the empirical results for the period 1961 to 2016. And I consider certain reforms in the management and governance of organizations to implement such a scenario.