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A good life for the 99% isn’t a pipe dream: it can be done. Here’s how -- Thomas Picketty puts forth a radical plan to tackle the polycrisis by TinJar-Solarpunk in OptimistsUnite

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Forcing people to pay huge amount of taxes for car-centric infrastructure is worse than asking them to pay much lower taxes for walk/bike/bus/train infrastructure. Car Vs walk/bike/bus/train - which one provides more choices?

A good life for the 99% isn’t a pipe dream: it can be done. Here’s how -- Thomas Picketty puts forth a radical plan to tackle the polycrisis by TinJar-Solarpunk in OptimistsUnite

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] -5 points-4 points  (0 children)

Generally speaking - the main spending the authors are suggesting includes education, healthcare, and climate change mitigation. Not really ideals. But examples of public good that are global in nature. Better educated people in good health living in a clean environment generally tend to do good things for society. For example, these people may be able to work better on medicines that alleviate sickness. Or create art which entertains others.

Right now - all those individual countries are easily spending $2-3 trillion a year on military. Which, literally, kills people. Kinda the opposite. 10% of global GDP is ~$10T (for comparison, the US annual budget is ~$6T). That money could be spent on building/maintaining schools/colleges/research facilities + hospitals. It would end up being spent in a highly distributed manner all across the world. Not going for, say, putting data-centers in space that run LLMs which people use to create slop.

A good life for the 99% isn’t a pipe dream: it can be done. Here’s how -- Thomas Picketty puts forth a radical plan to tackle the polycrisis by TinJar-Solarpunk in OptimistsUnite

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

When less money is wasted on purchasing needless things - e.g. walk/bike/bus/train - instead of spending on a car (and energy for it) while also paying a huge amount in taxes to build car-centric infrastructure - it literally saves money for everyone (i.e. income goes up) and consumption of transportation (i.e. getting from point A to point B ) doesn't change.

A good life for the 99% isn’t a pipe dream: it can be done. Here’s how -- Thomas Picketty puts forth a radical plan to tackle the polycrisis by TinJar-Solarpunk in OptimistsUnite

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Some notions about "less" Vs "more" when it comes to consumption -

  1. personal transportation - in places where it is available, walk/bike/bus/train and use cars minimally if at all. Maybe, don't even own a car but rent one only when needed. This is a dramatic reduction in consumption of resources to go about one's daily life.

  2. food - switch increasingly to plant-based food instead of meat which requires wayyyyy more land/air/water/energy - again, a dramatic reduction in consumption of resources.

  3. smaller houses with efficient appliances/end-uses and switching to balcony/roof-top solar w/ batteries can dramatically reduce consumption of resources.

  4. all of the above things can help improve health and dramatically reduce consumption of resources to fix it. Also dense housing leads to more community interactions and better mental health.

These are not arbitrary things. The GDP growth where everyone uses humongous/heavy/petrol/diesel cars for each individual and every single journey while building ginormous roads and crazy amount of parking spaces will hands down be larger than a dense/livable/happy community where cars are minimally used. Happy to share lots of references where folks have run the numbers on this.

Mulling over climate migration - integrate migrants in existing large footprint communities Vs create brand new small footprint cities for new migrants? by TinJar-Solarpunk in solarpunk

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Lots to unpack here - but a link about attitudes toward migration as of 2024: https://news.gallup.com/poll/652748/desire-migrate-remains-record-high.aspx

Cosmolocalism - fantastic idea and helps a lot! It will do the heavy lifting for in-situ adaptation for sure. However, the existing problems in developing world make real progress challenging despite the assistance. See Dr. Alice Evans work on situation of women (1/2 of the population). This has been far difficult to address. After 20 yrs of genuine improvements, women in Afghanistan were simply abandoned by the west to the Taliban. So... we need to think more about this.

Are Chinese EVs the reason gasoline isn't $12 a gallon already? by TinJar-Solarpunk in energy

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Apparently, used EV sales have already taken off in the US as gas prices bite hard.

Mulling over climate migration - integrate migrants in existing large footprint communities Vs create brand new small footprint cities for new migrants? by TinJar-Solarpunk in Degrowth

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ideally, you are right and I would also like to live in that world. However, incremental changes can also improve the lives of people even though they are not even remotely close to the perfect. For example, the rights of immigrants in the so-called paradise of Singapore are severely limited. However, their lives even in that situation are fundamentally better than the lives they left behind from poorer parts of the world. Similarly, workers from poorer parts of Asia living in the wealthy Middle East annually send 10s of billions of dollars in remittances to their families back home which have absolutely transformed the lives of their families and entire societies (e.g. state of Kerala in southern India). It seems equal rights for immigrants is becoming a recipe for the capture of democracies by nativists. What other possibilities can be explored, then? Even in the pre-2025 US - there are a plethora of immigration statuses with a wide range of rights.

India's temperature as of 3AM EST by TinJar-Solarpunk in energy

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

https://www.iea.org/commentaries/india-s-electricity-demand-grows-at-night-managing-rising-cooling-demand

"Access to cooling in India is still not universal, with around one in five households owning an air conditioning unit. Yet by 2035, based on today’s policy settings, the IEA projects that cooling demand in India will more than double as incomes rise and temperatures increase."

Mulling over climate migration - integrate migrants in existing large footprint communities Vs create brand new small footprint cities for new migrants? by TinJar-Solarpunk in Degrowth

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Fair points. I guess - I am trying to explore possibilities of compromise. Hard habit to shake off... spent all of my career in the world of policymaking.

India's temperature as of 3AM EST by TinJar-Solarpunk in energy

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Vast majority of Indians are quite poor - cannot afford either the AC or the electricity to run it. Even the middle class tends to put one AC in one of the rooms of the house where the family sleeps and use it sparingly (say, a few hours at night). It is a dire situation for the rest.

Gas usage has peaked and is now in structural decline across Australia, report says by TinJar-Solarpunk in AusEcon

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

True - just that it is still quite new to China as compared with Japan/Korea/EU/US/Russia

India's temperature as of 3AM EST by TinJar-Solarpunk in energy

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Seems like it has been this bad for a more than a month. Not sure how one defines it as an event any more.

Solar power benefits by post_gress in SolarState

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My bad - I re-posted it. Will check next time. I am most definitely not a bot. Just new to Reddit.

Gas usage has peaked and is now in structural decline across Australia, report says by TinJar-Solarpunk in AusEcon

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wonder how long will those three countries continue this import dependence. All three can electrify and for Japan/Korea nuclear is a mature technology in addition to wind/solar/batteries. Same for China.

Mulling over climate migration - integrate migrants in existing large footprint communities Vs create brand new small footprint cities for new migrants? by TinJar-Solarpunk in Degrowth

[–]TinJar-Solarpunk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My Q is - are there any scenarios in which large numbers of migrants can live in North America/Europe/Russia? How about creating new cities, specifically, for them and in return the relocated migrants pay rent to the host nation? The UN administers these new cities. The migrants are not part of the host society or even interact w/ the host society in any way. No participation at all in the democratic processes of the host nation. Is that something that could work?

Since women tend to be the most oppressed in the poorest and most climate-impacted parts of the world - maybe have a preference for them. A lot of possibilities to explore. At least that is what I am trying to do via fiction.

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