Can capitalism survive without constant growth?

[H2Bro]

I apologize if my post was drifting off topic, it seemed in-line with previous posts, however. I would like to make the point that, in a topic asking 'if capitalism can continue, is it sustainable, can we sustain indefinite growth...etc' A very logical starting point is defining precisely what you mean by capitalism, growth, and sustainability.

This isn't like talking about the Boltzmann constant or another completely unambiguous concept, people encounter the terms capitalism and sustainability in their every day lives quite frequently and generally develop different ideas or connotations about them than how they are used in academic settings. More importantly, these terms develop different meanings in the minds of everday folks according to their profession, disposition, and especially politics, so there is no singular 'layman usage'. So, when I offer a precise definition of capitalism, its not because I think that's what we should talk about, rather, that is a necessary precursor to having a mutually intelligible discussion without talking about different things or past each other. Its not just semantics (nor linguistics, unless you want to argue about pronounciation).

The question 'is capitalism sustainable' has a few interpretations, I'll do my best to hack out an answer for each I can think up.

'Can our current economic mode of organization continue indefinitely into the future?'
No, absolutely not. One basic way of looking at this is that the mantle does not convect enough hard metals up into accessible continental crusts to replace our current rate of consumption. Recycling has hard limits because processes like casting and alloying are often non-reversible. We can try 'asteroid mining', but not indefinitely, because this requires insane amounts of energy in the form of fossil fuels. These fuels are currently being diverted towards families 2nd and 3rd cars, because this resource is allocated by market mechanisms (i.e. whoever can pay for it) and not socialist mechanisms (i.e. where such resources will give the greatest societal value [see the important of definitions now -snark-])In straight material terms, and for straight material reasons, I think the answer is no.

'Can a market-oriented society that utilizes banks for lending and raising capital continue indefinitely into the future?'
Sure, I don't see any reason why not. You see, I think the market mechanisms are terribly efficient, and a big explanatory factor in the eastern-blocs dissolution was their coordination problems. So long as this kind of market organization is used for coordinating production and consumption of services and goods that are renewable / replenishable or at least not dwindling at terrifying rates, I think its a very good plan for society. Perhaps at some point in the future we will have enough 'big data' streams that can aggregate individual wants geographically and temporally and coordinate these with distributors and producers to coordinate the economy even better than markets. But until then, prices are likely our most effective signal mechanism.

Banks are also a very important social institution. Without such a thing as debt it would be nearly impossible to start big projects or take risks on the payoffs of future inventions, i.e. how can I start up a research lab that hasnt produced any value yet without a loan? Banks are dangerous when they mix functions, like speculations and savings, but before 1980 this wasn't a problem in the US (and still isn't a problem in Canada).

Now for sustainability...
Now, a lot of people use sustainable to mean 'can it go on for a fairly long time without crashing', but this isn't really what I think sustainable means. Sustainability, in a more technical sense, asks whether a process can continue by solely utilizing energy derived from Earth's daily solar input combined with geothermal emissions. We can call this the daily energy budget for Earth. Earth has acquired a respectable savings account of energy in the form of hydrocarbons locked up in the crust, produced over aeons by bacteria that built up complex organic compounds utilizing, you guessed it, the daily energy budget.

As a society we are burning through fossil fuels pretty darn quick. This isn't really taking a loan out, rather, our genetic grandparents left us a hefty inheritance and, like some 22 year old, are buying ferraris and hookers left and right. The inheritance simply won't last forever.

So, is capitalism sustainable? No, it isn't. Capitalist development is predicated on returns. We can't get returns on the daily energy budget of Earth because of conservation laws. We CAN get returns on energy production by utilizing our energy budget to construct contraptions that extract energy from our savings account. This is precisely what began the industrial revolution, btw. The moment we started dipping into our savings account, our population, standard of living, rate of growth, all absolutely exploded.

So, our current model isn't sustainable in and of itself, simply because it eats up huge savings far in excess of our daily budget. What capitalist development CAN do, I believe, is get us to a point technologically where we can produce ample standards of livings within our daily budget, i.e. let's get efficient PV, significantly net-positive fusion, well insulated homes, small or 0 commutes, etc. So far, all the returns we have gained from accessing our savings account have been used to develop better and more viscious means of accessing our savings account, meanwhile our actual RoI is crashing horribly (turn of the centry you could get 100b of oil for 1b of energy input, in Alberta today that's more like 3 to 1). If we start diverting a sizable amount of our extacted savings into methods for more efficiently capturing energy from our daily budget, we will be in much better shape when crash time comes. If we are very good at it, maybe there won't be a crash time.

Metaphorically, we can use our inheritance to live freely and wildly for a few awesome years buying ferraris and hookers. Or, we can make some smart investments to live off the interest in later years. Right now our global economy is based on the hookers-and-blow model, and as I mentioned before, the persistence of incentive structures and the entrenched authority and power of those who benefit most from them make it difficult if not impossible to transition out of this mode without outright colllapse. At which point, we might be too broke in terms of cheap energy to make those wise investments.

p.s. apologies for the length.

 

[H2Bro]

When I walk through a walmart or similar store I see directly the great tragedy of the modern age.

Utilizing our one-time one-shot inheritance of cheap energy to produce plastic disposable crap that is useless within a couple years. Even worse, we burn through rocket-launches worth of fuel for the benefit of having it made in a far off land, so retailers get a cost savings of a few cents, an capture the market by underselling the competitors.

I could not imagine a more colossal or tragic waste of a finite resource.

 

[frish]

Hey Bro
You definition is too narrow.
What about?
sustainable era of cheap clean energy form gen IV reactors"= era of CCE

Alos, can we put sime time range on. Like till 2100. Otherwise we need to consider
exticyion of Sun and 'ultimate fate of universe'

 

[H2Bro]

Hey Bro
You definition is too narrow.
What about?
sustainable era of cheap clean energy form gen IV reactors"= era of CCE

Alos, can we put sime time range on. Like till 2100. Otherwise we need to consider
exticyion of Sun and 'ultimate fate of universe'

It's not clear what you're talking about.

 

[BWV]

so what exactly are the limits of growth (in the developed world) over the next 100 years?

For energy, in the US we have about a quadrillion MCF of natural gas reserves and within the next decade solar PV will become economic.

fresh water is an energy problem - given cheap enough energy and you can create as much as you want

other mineral resources are either abundant (i.e. iron) or substitutable(rare Earth's) or eventually can be gotten from space

the avenues for growing per capita wealth:

- Manufacturing will progress to the point where the only costs for "stuff" are energy and materials

-advances in health care enabling people to live longer healthier lives

 

[frish]

It's not clear what you're talking about.

Well - You say:
a process can continue by solely utilizing energy derived from Earth's daily solar input combined with geothermal emissions. We can call this the daily energy budget for Earth.

That seems to be to strict limit on 'sustainable' . If mankind can live from an energy source for
few hundred years - without problems -- then I would call that sustainable life.

The gen IV nuclear reactors ww.gen-4.org/Technology/evolution.htm do offer such a source,
so - once we learn how to build them, we have additional sources of energy.

BTW, I did listen to dr West TED lecture. Very interesting. Thanks for the tip.

Peter

 

[H2Bro]

so what exactly are the limits of growth (in the developed world) over the next 100 years?

That's a really tough question to just answer from the hip. My guess would be, obtaining enough liquid fuels cheaply enough to maintain current modes of economic activity. Right now our entire supply and transport infrastructure is based on gasoline / diesel engines. Fuel prices that keep growing will make a lot of activity unfeasible, i.e. importing oranges from florida if you live in New York. It can be done, but the price of oranges will go up, people will stop buying, or look for alternatives.

This goes across the board, especially with manufacturing. But there are flip sides to this - manufacturing could return to North America on a big scale, food production could be local, people might eat (god forbid) seasonal foods instead of assuming mangos and kiwis in winter are the norm. It's tough to say what the limit on TOTAL growth is, because as some industries decline, others grow up (You can read up on Creative Destruction, also from Schumpeter), what affects total growth is, I suppose, the market capitalization of various firms in decline or ascension - but even market cap is not based on real asset value, but estimated value.

Another possible roadblock to growth is economic inequality. If the majority of people can't afford the majority of goods because they can hardly get by, it's tough to grow new high tech businesses. You can get around this with a massive extension of household debt, but look where that got us in 2008. One very very Rich person simply doesn't buy enough bread-and-butter consumer goods to boost aggregate demand more than a dozen middle class folks.

other mineral resources are either abundant (i.e. iron) or substitutable(rare Earth's) or eventually can be gotten from space

Are rare Earth's substitutable? My understanding was that, because they are not, China has a strategic monopoly on them. There are economic theories saying that as the costs of extraction of certain resources increase, industries move to utilize different ones. Problem is there is not an unlimited variety of materials to make things like trusses out of.

Getting things from space is also problematic unless the price of metals gets really, really high, and the price of liquid fuels somehow goes down as well. Right now, if there was a 1kg nugget of Gold floating conveniently in a low Earth orbit, it would cost more money to send something up to bring it down than the gold is worth. It goes without saying that iron or REM's are even less feasible.

the avenues for growing per capita wealth:

- Manufacturing will progress to the point where the only costs for "stuff" are energy and materials

I guess you mean the only difference is that humans will not need to be recompensated for their efforts, because as it is the only costs of manufacturing are energy, materials, and labor. This is unlikely because ultimately people build and maintain those robots. The factory can get by with less people, but it puts more people out of work as well, so demand for those products can drop unless they are re-skilled. Also note that automation is the primary reason for worker productivity increases over the last few decades, so its less a matter of everyone producing more than it is where a similar amount of goods being produced by less people.

Here's where marxism comes in. The wages you pay to workers need only recompensate them for the education investments they undertake to get those jobs, therefore the rises in wages are not commensurate with rises in productivity. That's great for manufacturing owners, terrible for the majority of workers, and as you may have noticed income inequality is a huge barrier for growth.

-advances in health care enabling people to live longer healthier lives

Then we damned well better increase the retirement age!

 

[H2Bro]

That seems to be to strict limit on 'sustainable' . If mankind can live from an energy source for
few hundred years - without problems -- then I would call that sustainable life.

It is a very strict definition indeed. I'd call that 'hard sustainability' as opposed to something that can just last beyond the next 10 generations or so.

BTW, I did listen to dr West TED lecture. Very interesting. Thanks for the tip.

Peter

Dr. West is probably my favorite physicist that doesn't really do physics.

 

[Pythagorean]

The responses to this thread seem to fall into one of two categories. One is that Capitalism is the best system there is and the end is inevitable so just hang on for the horrifying decline. The other response wants to get into the semantics of the meaning of growth, sustainable, and Capitalism turning this into a question of linguistics.

Ryan was the only one who attempted to answer my questions.

The questions were is capitalism sustainable?

If so, how and why?

If not, what are some sustainable steady state alternatives?

I don't believe my answer fell into either of those two categories. My answer was that the core aspects of capitalism are sustainable, but the implementation of capitalism would have to evolve. I mostly talked about the how and why, though. And didn't explicitly answer your questions piecewise.

To your last question, there is no steady state. Steady-state is death. There are stable dynamics, but transitions must occur with an evolving society. But I don't see capitalism going anywhere without some major (and unlikely) behavioral revisions in human nature. The thing about capitalism is that it can encompass the transitions; it makes the most of them by being an adaptive (and competitive system).

 

[Jim Kata]

Thank you H2Bro for your analysis on sustainability. Your assessment that the current system which relies almost entirely on non renewable resources is unsustainable is right. You also hint at the core of the problem which is really the harder question to answer. People may say greed and avarice is just human nature, and I'm not claiming humans are altruistic, but it misses the primary driving force of human nature and that is incentives. IMO if humans are incentivised to do good they will do good, and if they are incentivised to do bad they will do bad. Why were there so many sub prime mortgages? The system incetivised this kind of lending. Why does Wall Street engage in so much dangerous speculation? The incentives of the system. So for long term sustainability the system needs to be changed from one which incentivises short term profit at the expense of sustainability.

H2Bro also hit on some of the solutions I've been thinking about. A kind of localization of the economy where communities become much more self sustaining, i.e. buy local. Another thing I was thinking about was maybe redefining the definition of corporation. Corporations want personage. They want to be vested with the right's and privileges of citizenship. Well then, they should also have to fulfill the obligations of citizenship. Such as, maybe tying their corporate charters if not to environmental neutrality at least to mitigated environmental impact through a carbon trade or something.

In order to protect against capital flight, you would probably have to resort to some extreme measures.

What are some suggestions to changing the incentives of the current economic system which promotes profits at the expense of all else?

Yes, I agree you can wait for the market to fix the problems on its own, but I don't think you would like to live through the the market's fixing of them. I mean when we run out of fossil fuels we can just return to the dark ages, but I would prefer if people had planned ahead instead of just waiting for the market to sort it out.

 

[BWV]

But these discussions presuppsose two very dubious propositions, A) that some group of people has the ability to successfully allocate resources in a more efficient manner than free markets in liberal societies and B) political processes will recognize this, discerning the "right" answer from competing plans and give this group the power to implement their plans (usually disregarding formalities like due process and other constitiutional liberties)

 

[Jim Kata]

But these discussions presuppsose two very dubious propositions, A) that some group of people has the ability to successfully allocate resources in a more efficient manner than free markets in liberal societies and B) political processes will recognize this, discerning the "right" answer from competing plans and give this group the power to implement their plans (usually disregarding formalities like due process and other constitiutional liberties)

Do we actually have free markets? It seems to me that many of the vital resources such as fossil fuels and commodities are controlled by a small group of companies and firms. In fact I am always a bit dubious of people and companies that preach the evangel of the free market since a lot of times it is these very same people who come begging for the government dole in the form of subsidies and bailouts when it is their turn to face market discipline. If you believe in free markets fine, but be willing to live by them and die by them. I know this is not possible because of systemic risk, but then what is the free market's response to systemic risk?

 

[frish]

Jim Kata: You say

Do we actually have free markets?
If you believe in free markets fine.

What are some suggestions to changing the incentives of the current
economic system which promotes profits at the expense of all else?


And by that you are leading us into same semantic trap, which you prepared with 'capitalism'.
========================================================
Indeed::

1) Free market. If USA would finally catch up, and following EU, starts charging tax on CO2 emissions,
leaving it to companies how they accomplish that - is it still a ' free market'? Some (including me) would say yes - since they just pay for what they took from the 'commons'. Other would say it is a subsidy for non-polluting producers.
Koch brothers would spend billions to prove that it is wrong to subsidize renewables.

So - If you believe in free markets you are hopeless victim of right wing sloganeering.

2) Which promotes profits ... . Every company goes after profits and that is OK.
Example: if society would introduce carbon tax then companies would minimize CO2 pollution IN ORDER TO increase their (final) profit (profit after taxes).

So--- in conclusion -- this 'debate is so fuzzy -- that I am seeing little sense to continue,

BUT - and I hope you will appreciate it, I will offer my final conclusion.
+++++++++++++++++++
Capitalism may be sustained for few more decades - but in the long run only socialism is sustainable.
Why ? Becouse goal is not 'most efficient' or optimal distribution of resources - but (as socialism says) it is to make people happy.
As resources are getting scarce, those who own land, mineral resources, water ..
tend to get rich and those who live through the work of their hands (proletariat) are getting unemployed,
as described e.g. here:>

Andrew McAfee: Are droids taking our jobs?
> http://www.ted.com/talks/andrew_mcafee_are_droids_taking_our_jobs.html
> and in book
Vonegut: Player piano.

This is not Ludism. There will be some new jobs in health, services and research, but most of useful work will be done by robots.
Since people are not that stupid any more, they will insist that products will get shared. They will not start dying of hunget in order to maintain 'optimal distribution' of goods.

So - final sustainable state will be 'to each according to his needs' -- but if anyone would dare
call it communism s/he will be persecuted or prosecuted or both.

 

[BWV]

Do we actually have free markets?

no country has ever been perfectly free markets, but what we have has worked just fine to make the Western world and several Asian countries rich

It seems to me that many of the vital resources such as fossil fuels and commodities are controlled by a small group of companies and firms.

Some places yes, some no. The markets for energy in the US and Canada are pretty open, with hundreds of companies producing energy. Eight years ago the expert consensus was that North America was running out of natural gas and now, thanks to technology no one anticipated, we have 100+ year supply.

In fact I am always a bit dubious of people and companies that preach the evangel of the free market since a lot of times it is these very same people who come begging for the government dole in the form of subsidies and bailouts when it is their turn to face market discipline.

Sure companies look for handouts and special protections from government, but that does not justify a blanket ad hominem argument

If you believe in free markets fine, but be willing to live by them and die by them. I know this is not possible because of systemic risk, but then what is the free market's response to systemic risk?

now you are jumping off topic. systemic risk refers to the interrelation between banking systems and money. Given that the financial sector is unique in its ability to affect money supply, some regulation is required.

 

[BWV]

To be clear, socialism generally refers to state ownership of the means of production - a definition that hardly anyone who calls themselves a socialist these days really believes in, the idea being thoroughly debunked in economic circles and in practice by everyone who has ever tried it. The key problem is that no entity can either obtain or process the information required to run a centrally planned economy because the information is dispersed among its individual members. Furthermore this entity would require near-dictatorial powers as it would have to regulate and control nearly every aspect of a citizen's life. (this was Hayek's criticism, i.e. the Road to Serfdom or The Use of Knowledge in Society)

Capitalism is not inherently incompatible with a generous social welfare system - and basically every socialist political party in existence today believes in a regulated free market with generous welfare policies

 

[ImaLooser]

As a society we are burning through fossil fuels pretty darn quick. This isn't really taking a loan out, rather, our genetic grandparents left us a hefty inheritance and, like some 22 year old, are buying ferraris and hookers left and right. The inheritance simply won't last forever.

So, is capitalism sustainable? No, it isn't. Capitalist development is predicated on returns. We can't get returns on the daily energy budget of Earth because of conservation laws.

It is possible to get return on investment without excessive consumption of resources. Hollywood movies, computer games, etc.

 

[256bits]

It is possible to get return on investment without excessive consumption of resources. Hollywood movies, computer games, etc.

Possibly.
Just take the internet though for example. It is an energy hog and not as 'green' as would be expected.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/23/t...ts-of-energy-belying-industry-image.html?_r=0

Worldwide, the digital warehouses use about 30 billion watts of electricity, roughly equivalent to the output of 30 nuclear power plants, according to estimates industry experts compiled for The Times. Data centers in the United States account for one-quarter to one-third of that load, the estimates show.

Just thought I would throw that into counter any belief that being green does not have an impact upon resource usage.

 

[nitsuj]

Sure, but you aren't saying the Earth could support 7 billion capitalists or 12 billion socialists, are you?

lol, I'll take that.

Of course it can, if I presume socialists are fine with eating less and not messing with the chemical balance of Earth much.

joking aside it's a weak connection; that capitalism is cannibalistic. In fact I think the opposite. capitalism is a going concern, no different than an individual business that must be able to "adapt" to changes in the "environment" (pun).

This is nothing new to capitalism, we maybe so lucky that capitalism will continue to provide...for a profit of course .

The "Pandora's Box" in capitalism is "for profit". Of course states govern this as best they can, balancing the ideals of capitalism / socialism.

That said isn't the OP asking from a consumer product perspective, and for that I'd say we may not always have "more" but we will always have "better", and that's thanks to capitalism & that is economic growth.

 

[mheslep]

But in the process of growth you use up resources that don't come back when you contract.

Yes, some resources like fossil fuels don't come back.

In the process of growth improvements come about, like telephones, computers, LED lighting, vaccines, efficient farming, better batteries, the air plane, plural societies. Improvements, being ideas, can't be used up and don't go away with contraction.

 

[nazarbaz]

Something seems to elude most posts : the very existence of capitalism is related to the scarcity of natural resources. That's why "capitals" are not equally distributed in society for the classical theory of economics. Capitalism is essentially an engine that creates more "wealth" from less resources. The capacity to adapt is its biggest strength : it uses any means available to generate riches.
The capitalism we know is only a case of a much larger domain : economical systems. Its ideologies and oppositions (like that of government and individual) are superficial. To quote Gilles Deleuze, it's an "axiomatic of decoded streams" that uses whatever it finds to grow and multiply. To some extent, the system is not built on the sustainibility of resources but on the ability to create new ones : money is the most important example. So now we create money from money in a world of symbolic machines that rely less on physical inputs than on imagination : and that is the real and imminent problem.

 

[ImaLooser]

Something seems to elude most posts : the very existence of capitalism is related to the scarcity of natural resources. That's why "capitals" are not equally distributed in society for the classical theory of economics.

I suppose that is true. If there were unlimited, easily available natural resources then there would be no need to produce anything. There would be no means of production at all. So there would be no issue as to the ownership to the non-existent means of production.

 

[nazarbaz]

There's no such thing as a natural limit or foundation to capitalism. It's not a natural fact but a technology : its limitations are social and political.

 

[H2Bro]

There's no such thing as a natural limit or foundation to capitalism. It's not a natural fact but a technology : its limitations are social and political.

I like this way of looking at it, Capitalism as technology or just a cultural innovation.

The question becomes how we can sustain a high level of symbolic economy using as little physical substrate as possible, i.e., the most number of value added services or innovative software which doesn't actually use much resources beyond electricity per unit of product, with as little coal, steel, lumber, etc, as possible.

The problem of how to increase efficiency gains in infrastructure and manufacturing or vehicles, things that use raw physical inputs and are actually scarce, is one that will be addressed as inputs rise in price automatically. Thats the nature of the capitalist allocation algorithm. It is, in a sense, a dynamically robust system.

 

[enosis_]

I heard a report that says that the Earth may have passed its carrying capacity. Which means the life systems of this planet are now in decline and can no longer sustain themselves. I read that 30% of the great barrier reef has disappeared over the last thirty years.

My question is can capitalism work as a zero to minimal growth, sustainable system, or is growth required for the capitalist system to work? The assumption that a country like the United States or any country can have 3% GDP growth till the end of time is foolish since we are living in a world in which resources are more and more scarce and areas for the expansion of markets are becoming more and more rare.

What are some sustainable economic models?

Hasn't US GDP remained less than 2% for the past few years?

 

[Jim Kata]

Capitalism maybe extremely capable at adaption, but it seems terrible at planning ahead. I just look at this global warming debacle. The fossil fuel industry will not respond until it is probably too late and the modern world we know is destroyed. The short term profit motive which drives corporate capitalism around the world is completely unsustainable, as far as its wasteful use of non renewable resources, and it seems that it will only change if absolutely forced to. As long as the profit motive is the driving force behind it, I don't see the system changing. If the system does not become more sustainable in its use of resources and stewardship of the environment, I think the human species maybe in trouble.

The pessimistic side of me says this is the way it is and just don't have children and hope you die before things get too bad.

The optimistic side hopes the system can be changed into a more sustainable one.

 

[enosis_]

Capitalism maybe extremely capable at adaption, but it seems terrible at planning ahead. I just look at this global warming debacle. The fossil fuel industry will not respond until it is probably too late and the modern world we know is destroyed. The short term profit motive which drives corporate capitalism around the world is completely unsustainable, as far as its wasteful use of non renewable resources, and it seems that it will only change if absolutely forced to. As long as the profit motive is the driving force behind it, I don't see the system changing. If the system does not become more sustainable in its use of resources and stewardship of the environment, I think the human species maybe in trouble.

The pessimistic side of me says this is the way it is and just don't have children and hope you die before things get too bad.

The optimistic side hopes the system can be changed into a more sustainable one.

Aren't you confusing progress with Capitalism?

 

[Jim Kata]

Aren't you confusing progress with Capitalism?

I'm not sure what you mean by progress? If the extinction of the human race is progress, then I guess so.

 

[enosis_]

I'm not sure what you mean by progress? If the extinction of the human race is progress, then I guess so.

The industrial revolution, indoor plumbing and heat, mechanized farming, and motorized transportation all seem to be progress - the cost is not necessarily "the extinction of the human race" - is it?

 

[Jim Kata]

The industrial revolution, indoor plumbing and heat, mechanized farming, and motorized transportation all seem to be progress - the cost is not necessarily "the extinction of the human race" - is it?

What is ignored by this analysis is that the exponential progress the human race has made since the industrial revolution has been due to an exponential depletion of natural resources. When the resources that have made this progress possible are expended the progress will halt. I do not know the affects global warming or massive habitat destruction will ultimately have, but I don't imagine they will be good. The current global economic system doesn't seem to be planning for these effects and it may prove impossible to reverse these effects. I do not see unfettered capitalism as a system well built for dealing with issues such as proper stewardship of the environment.

 

[enosis_]

What is ignored by this analysis is that the exponential progress the human race has made since the industrial revolution has been due to an exponential depletion of natural resources. When the resources that have made this progress possible are expended the progress will halt. I do not know the affects global warming or massive habitat destruction will ultimately have, but I don't imagine they will be good. The current global economic system doesn't seem to be planning for these effects and it may prove impossible to reverse these effects. I do not see unfettered capitalism as a system well built for dealing with issues such as proper stewardship of the environment.

I find your use of the words "unfettered capitalism" interesting. I don't think this system exists anywhere except in textbooks - the real world has regulations. The exception to this statement could be in a communist system - where environmental regulations might be considered counter-productive?