Blueprint for a Better Planet
(Page 3 of 10)
A NEW KIND OF PATRIOTISM
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Adopting Plan B is unlikely unless the united States
assumes a leadership position, much as it did in World War
II. After an all-out mobilization, the U.S. engagement
helped turn the tide, leading the Allied Forces to victory
within three-and-a-half years. Achieving this goal was
possible only by converting existing industries to the war
effort and using materials that previously went toward
manufacturing civilian goods. The year 1942 witnessed the
greatest expansion of industrial output in the nation's
history—all for military use. Early in the year, the
U.S. government banned the production and sale of cars and
trucks for private use, halted residential and highway
construction, and banned driving for pleasure. It also
introduced a rationing program involving products such as
tires, gasoline, fuel oil and sugar. Cutting back on
consumption of these goods liberated resources to support
the war effort.
In retrospect, the speed of the conversion from a
peacetime to a wartime economy was stunning .
Harnessing U.S. industrial power tipped the scales
decisively toward the Allied Forces, reversing the tide of
war: Germany and Japan could not match the United States'
effort.
This mobilization of resources within a matter of months
demonstrates that a country, and indeed the world, can
restructure its economy quickly if convinced of the need to
do so. The issue is not whether most people will eventually
be won over, but whether they will be convinced before the
bubble economy collapses.
CREATING AN HONEST MARKET
The key to restructuring the economy is the creation of an
honest market, one that tells the ecological truth. The
market is an incredible institution, but it does have three
weaknesses: It does not incorporate the indirect costs of
goods and services, it does not value nature's services
properly, and it does not respect the sustainable-yield
thresholds of natural systems such as fisheries, forests,
rangelands and aquifers.
Throughout most of recorded history, the indirect costs of
economic activity—the sustainable yields of natural
systems or the value of nature's services—were of
little concern because the scale of human activity was so
small relative to the size of the Earth. But with the
sevenfold expansion in the world economy over the last
half-century, failing to address these market shortcomings
and the economic distortions they create will lead to
economic decline.
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