Somewhere in my past, I remember hearing wisdom about how life tends to "ebb and flow," suggesting that we experience period of growth and periods of decline.
This morning, I was reading an article about population contraction in Japan, and how the current birth rate has fallen to about 1.2 per family, as compared to the 2.1 to 2.2 births required to maitain a stable population. By "worst case" estimates, the population of Japan might drop 40% from what it is today.
Of course, this just speaks to the population of a place.
Made me sit back and consider how population decline would collide with our obsession (at least in most industrialized nations, the US especially) with GROWTH at any cost.
Which, in turn, made me think back to that original "ebb-and-flow" comment, and the overall idea of why we consider a bit of contraction to be such a bad thing. Moreover, who exactly is it that considers contraction to be such a bad thing?
As an individual, I feel like I have been "contracting" for the better part of a decade. Part of this is the natural flow of aging; smaller house, fewer needs, kids leaving home and so forth.
But society is extremely resistant to contraction.
I even think about Mrs. Denmarkguy and my desire to move to a smaller place in the next few years. It's challenging to even find smaller places. There's enormous economic resistance from the construction industry to build smaller and more affordable homes.
I remember when when I left University — in 1985 — it was not that difficult to go out and find a 2-bedroom, 2-bathroom house of about 1,000 to 1,200 square feet (90-110 sq. m.) at a reasonably affordable affordable price.
Self-proclaimed economic experts insist that we are "better off" because starter homes today are much bigger and have more features but that's based on the false assumption that we actually want these bigger homes... which naturally also carry a bigger price tag.
I do not.
The entire point of moving to a smaller place is... well... WANTING A SMALLER PLACE. And a more affordable place.
The marketplace is failing to meet demand. But it is being "indicated" to me that what I demand is not "in demand." Even though most of our peers complain of the exact same problem.
Again, what's wrong with decline? And who is making this declaration about decline being evil?
Seems to me it's not actually people who are to blame, it's investment organizations who are beholden to their investors in terms of providing some specified rate of return... and that has little to do with actual demand.
In a different area of life, we see more and more car lots sitting with loads of unsold $80,000 luxury SUVs and trucks, while "entry level" cars in small sizes with lower price tags are being dropped entirely out of manufacturer lineups. Ostensibly there is less profit in lower end vehicles, so let's not make them.
There's something surreal and dis-easing about the subtext that consumers are no longer leading the marketplace through demand, but instead are falling victim to what I call "artificial demand" — basically being told what you can have via what manufacturers want to sell.
Of course, the economic situation may end up changing this, if we reach a tipping point where the consumer increasingly chooses "nothing" in the "buy what we are offering or have nothing" proposition that seems to be increasingly present.
And I fear that will result in times of decline. And it's about time!
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