My feature on whether the UK has reached “peak stuff” published in/on the Guardian today. Here are the links:
• Main feature: Has the UK reached peak stuff?
• Stats and graphics: Peak stuff – the data
• Response: Tim Jackson on the “cold comfort” of peak stuff
Nice to be on the front page of both the main paper and G2, as either one of those would have been a first for me. (And the feature is currently the most-read piece on Guardian site – having overcome a brief overtaking by Steve Jobs’s dying words. Sorry Steve!)
If I get time I’ll update this post with a bunch of thoughts which I didn’t have space or time to explore in the feature or data post … such as the possibility that if we’d noticed that consumption and GDP had decoupled in 2006, that might have been a red flag that our finance-driven economy had become increasingly separated from reality and that there was a big crash coming.
Update, 28 November. You can also read George Monbiot’s response, which appeared the next day. Note there are some thoughts from me in the comments below the article.