A scientist who predicted a grim 'Hothouse Earth' says the world’s billionaires need to give up their money to save us

[canuckster19]

22 minutes ago, peaches5 said:

The world is overpopulated why give up your money when you can build something underground and live safely there while the earth is cleansed? That's the cold hard truth. 

Essentially this, the only reason mass immigration exists is to keep money in the pockets of rich people ensuring there's always a cheap labour force, cause heaven forbid if for once companies had to compete for manpower instead of people having to compete for jobs, it should be cyclical like everything else in the economy, but it's the one aspect where the common man will always be at a disadvantage.

 

Without mass immigration we would be seeing survival of the fittest which is essentially how the rest of the world works. The west would be seeing a decrease in population and is that really a bad thing?

 

Let me provide an example, take bleeding heart liberal woman, she dies her hair blue and has a spiderweb tattoo on her arm, she thinks the western world has to make sure the rest of the world survives because it's "our fault" that there are starving children in Africa. Now one can debate about why there are starving children in Africa, but the question remains, can we ever really do anything about it or is that something that just has to sort itself out? People have been exploiting other people since the dawn of time, just like there are alpha people, there are alpha civilizations. 

 

Now lets take that same liberal woman, pretend she's a single cis hetero or whatever they like to call themselves, what we in the normal world call straight, she's looking for a mate, she can choose the Alpha male who has likely had his share of women and is the quintessential man whore, tall, good looks, douchebag style. There's the second guy, he's a nerd, a bit shy, has only ever had one "girlfriend", short, but he's smart so he's got that going for him. 99.9% of women don't choose this guy over the alpha male, even the real beta women who are probably far more ugly and blimped would rather keep their legs shut than give the beta guy a spin... now why is this? Biological instinct of course, survival of the fittest, it's actually something I have a hard time wrapping my head around, especially when you ask these women why they think these guys shouldn't be procreating.

 

I know I sound like I'm going off on a tangent, but my point is, maybe some beta civilizations can't or shouldn't survive, the same way beta males aren't allowed to procreate.

[taxi]

Don't see how people giving up wealth is going to stop the masses from producing carbon? 

[xereau]

30 minutes ago, peaches5 said:

The world is overpopulated why give up your money when you can build something underground and live safely there while the earth is cleansed? That's the cold hard truth. 

This is just a dirty lie spread by anti-human cult members.

You could take every single person on earth, put them in Alberta, give them 1/4 acre each, and the province would still be 1/3rd empty and the REST of the planet empty.

Still think its over populated?  You have been deceived.  You have been demoralized into hating your own species.

[48MPHSlapShot]

Call me what you will, but after so many years of people saying that the world is doomed in X amount of days, it's hard to take it that seriously any more. I'm pretty damn close to thinking that most of this "doom and gloom" talk is merely psuedoscience, failing to take into account the fact that humanity isn't stationary and stagnant, but rather adaptable and malleable.

[Gurn]

7 billion people can all have a 1/4 acre of Alberta real estate and have 1/3 empty?

That seems like hyperbole to me.

[peaches5]

36 minutes ago, xereau said:

This is just a dirty lie spread by anti-human cult members.

You could take every single person on earth, put them in Alberta, give them 1/4 acre each, and the province would still be 1/3rd empty and the REST of the planet empty.

Still think its over populated?  You have been deceived.  You have been demoralized into hating your own species.

India disagrees.

[RUPERTKBD]

2 hours ago, smithers joe said:

can you see, trump even giving up one penny of his wealth to save the earth? ain't going to happen. 

Maybe if someone told him the money was stolen by "rogue thieves".....

[RUPERTKBD]

2 hours ago, SabreFan1 said:

Yeah, one thing that this report doesn't take into account is human nature.  If the current billionaires gave up their wealth, there would be new people trying to take their place in order to start the cycle all over again.  If you tax people and businesses an exorbitant amount they'll just move their wealth and business to a lower taxed region.

 

You can try a flat 90% estate tax but the same thing will happen.  People will just claim residency in the lowest estate taxed country so that when they die their family keeps as much of the wealth that they can.

 

Short of turning the entire planet into a strict communist system, the rich will continue to try and become as rich as possible.  It's just how humans are hardwired.

But we already have billionaires giving money away. Gates, Buffet, Bloomberg.....and if you believe Republicans, George Soros gives billions to protesters every day....

[VanGnome]

Or we could as a society evolve beyond the base need to value everything with a dollar amount? Implement a hybrid system whereby world commodities are exchanged using a barter system, individuals and private companies work and are paid in currencies, governments tax modestly and capital infrastructure projects are funded privately instead of publicly using taxpayer dollars.

Corporations are taxed the heaviest, with their burden of taxation reduced based on their level of private funding of major projects to improve infrastructure, power generation, environment, space exploration, etc.

IMO governments should be much smaller, and stick to governing society through policy, let corporations do what they do best: provide a product or service that benefits a large majority of individuals. The more competition there is from the private sector, the cheaper things end up becoming and the quality goes up. Everyone wins.

[Gurn]

5 minutes ago, VanGnome said:

The more competition there is from the private sector, the cheaper things end up becoming and the quality goes up. Everyone wins.

Things get cheaper, people are earning less to make cheaper things and then nobody can afford anything?

[RUPERTKBD]

54 minutes ago, xereau said:

This is just a dirty lie spread by anti-human cult members.

You could take every single person on earth, put them in Alberta, give them 1/4 acre each, and the province would still be 1/3rd empty and the REST of the planet empty.

Still think its over populated?  You have been deceived.  You have been demoralized into hating your own species.

Can you explain that math?

 

From the figures I was able to find, 1/4 acre per person would max out at just under 640 million....

[VanGnome]

By "things" I'm not referring to consumer goods. I'm talking about the cost of infrastructure and other related major projects. People still get paid relative to their expertise and experience. They are simply taxed less because the government has less overhead.

Competition in a free market lowers prices for consumers when it comes to consumer goods because companies compete to provide a better product at a lower price to earn business/sales/etc.

As people provide higher levels of expertise, they get paid more. The end result is a better product that more people can afford and greater volumes, so despite paying people more the companies still make more ROI on R&D etc.

Now if you take those profits and invest in public works projects, things that are good for society as a whole, they reduce their tax burden thereby not only being responsible for the improvement of society, but they are taxed less on their net earnings, meaning they have more money to disperse among shareholders, invest in employee training, retention, pay increases which yields better and more expertise. It's self serving.

Capital projects are undertaken by privately held companies who receive the private corporate funding, and are able to contribute to the improvement of society. Capitalism is good, but it cannot go unchecked, and it needs to be tempered with social responsibility. We'd be so much further ahead as a society world wide (lifting people out of poverty, ending homelessness etc), if these kinds of incremental gains as I outline were the focus instead of record profits at the expense of the bottom end of society being affected.

I'm fairly well off, but I also practice what I preach. The company I work for is rated as the BEST in the entire world according to Forbes Fortune 100, because they employ precisely what I'm talking about: responsible corporate philanthropy that is championed by each individual employee.

[ForsbergTheGreat]

 

48 minutes ago, xereau said:

You could take every single person on earth, put them in Alberta, give them 1/4 acre each, and the province would still be 1/3rd empty and the REST of the planet empty.

I'm not so sure about that. There is 7.6 billion people in the world.  If each person got 1/4 acre, that would mean we'd need 1.9 billion acres of land.  The size of Alberta is only 163.5 million acres.  

 

The problem with overpopulation isn't about individual livable space, it's has to do with the negative affects of providing that large population with liveable amenities.  Things such as providing clean water, food and even clean air.  

 

[SabreFan1]

1 hour ago, RUPERTKBD said:

But we already have billionaires giving money away. Gates, Buffet, Bloomberg.....and if you believe Republicans, George Soros gives billions to protesters every day....

People like Gates, Buffet, and Bloomberg should be commended.  But for each one of them there are 10 more like the Rothschild's, Waltons, Rockefellers, Mellons, etc., etc.

 

The Soros  conspiracies are funny though.  I'm not a fan of his, but it's silly how much silliness is flung at him by the far right.

[taxi]

2 hours ago, xereau said:

This is just a dirty lie spread by anti-human cult members.

You could take every single person on earth, put them in Alberta, give them 1/4 acre each, and the province would still be 1/3rd empty and the REST of the planet empty.

Still think its over populated?  You have been deceived.  You have been demoralized into hating your own species.

You do realize that you can look this stuff up. There are about 158 million acres of land in Alberta. Your numbers don't jive.

 

That being said, many studies show the population is now expected to peak around 9 billion and then start to fall.

[taxi]

25 minutes ago, SabreFan1 said:

People like Gates, Buffet, and Bloomberg should be commended.  But for each one of them there are 10 more like the Rothschild's, Waltons, Rockefellers, Mellons, etc., etc.

 

The Soros  conspiracies are funny though.  I'm not a fan of his, but it's silly how much silliness is flung at him by the far right.

Interesting that the Rothschilds still come up when people think of rich people. That fortune is now divided among hundreds of people. No single member cracks the top 1000 richest people. The family, as a whole, has become a huge source of charity too.

[SabreFan1]

44 minutes ago, taxi said:

Interesting that the Rothschilds still come up when people think of rich people. That fortune is now divided among hundreds of people. No single member cracks the top 1000 richest people. The family, as a whole, has become a huge source of charity too.

I have never had anything against that family.  My point is that unlike the others mentioned they historically keep their money in their family.

[canuckster19]

1 hour ago, ForsbergTheGreat said:

 

I'm not so sure about that. There is 7.6 billion people in the world.  If each person got 1/4 acre, that would mean we'd need 1.9 billion acres of land.  The size of Alberta is only 163.5 million acres.  

 

The problem with overpopulation isn't about individual livable space, it's has to do with the negative affects of providing that large population with liveable amenities.  Things such as providing clean water, food and even clean air.  

 

Not to mention the amount of farmable land each person needs to maintain a balanced diet. 

https://ask.metafilter.com/77287/How-much-land-does-a-person-need

[Nuxfanabroad]

Good to see this topic getting air time. The problems are more complex than most of us realize. Majority of folks don't wanna consider/discuss the existential-shyte.. the ostrich-approach is favoured by the masses.

 

We were warned(by people like Swedish scientist Arrhenius) in the 19th freeken'Century! Big oil corps knew what was goin on decades back. They're guilty as sin.

 

One thing left now: brace for impact.

[mpt]

4 hours ago, SabreFan1 said:

I'm not saying go to an actual communistic state for the planet.  I'm saying that short of implementing a strict interpretation of that system, there will always be people who amass wealth for the sake of amassing wealth.

 

Strict Communism will always fail though because there is no incentive to work in a system where everything is shared equally.

 

That then goes back to my original point of the scientist's recommendation being a pipe dream.  There's just no good way to implement it.  Our nature as humans prevents it.

For sure, I wasn’t implying that you were in favour of communism