Putting this here so I can find it easily. Originally 2023-03-07. Contra Rafael Guthman; or, what a Malthusian economy looks like. Rafael is doing something genuinely interesting and valuable: he...
I viewed the graph and the peabrain looked for an Egyptian hump. There must have been a lot of ups and downs in those years. I wonder if climate and plagues could have been a factor.
You would expect Malthusian economies to be cyclic. They might start with a relatively high resource to population ratio, then the population would grow, and when the resource to population ratio fell below a certain level, the population would stop growing and shrink. Then, the next cycle would start. If you were a contemporary observer, you wouldn't think the economy was stagnant as the population grew and urbanization advanced nor during the downward phase with its famines, plagues and disasters.
The main difference between our modern economy and a classical Malthusian economy is that we can adopt new technologies more quickly. The more advanced iron plows of the Middle Ages based on Chinese models were slowly adopted over centuries, but a more modern economy could develop and adopt a new plow on a time scale of decades.
This doesn't mean a modern economy can't face resource pressure just that they are less likely to have dramatic demographic consequences. For example, consider the oil shocks of the 1970s. Petroleum was central to the economy. Then came new engine technologies, new extraction technologies, new petroleum discoveries and, more recently, cost effective solar and wind power. Petroleum is still important, but it is no longer the central driver.
If you wanted to complicate your model, adding one or more climate series from those in IPCC climate models may be first choice. Temperature, rainfall, monsoons may be relevant. Residuals from that could be imperial stability issues (though emperors and kings got killed pretty often).
I viewed the graph and the peabrain looked for an Egyptian hump. There must have been a lot of ups and downs in those years. I wonder if climate and plagues could have been a factor.
You would expect Malthusian economies to be cyclic. They might start with a relatively high resource to population ratio, then the population would grow, and when the resource to population ratio fell below a certain level, the population would stop growing and shrink. Then, the next cycle would start. If you were a contemporary observer, you wouldn't think the economy was stagnant as the population grew and urbanization advanced nor during the downward phase with its famines, plagues and disasters.
The main difference between our modern economy and a classical Malthusian economy is that we can adopt new technologies more quickly. The more advanced iron plows of the Middle Ages based on Chinese models were slowly adopted over centuries, but a more modern economy could develop and adopt a new plow on a time scale of decades.
This doesn't mean a modern economy can't face resource pressure just that they are less likely to have dramatic demographic consequences. For example, consider the oil shocks of the 1970s. Petroleum was central to the economy. Then came new engine technologies, new extraction technologies, new petroleum discoveries and, more recently, cost effective solar and wind power. Petroleum is still important, but it is no longer the central driver.
Another triumph for The Journal of Apophenic Results
If you wanted to complicate your model, adding one or more climate series from those in IPCC climate models may be first choice. Temperature, rainfall, monsoons may be relevant. Residuals from that could be imperial stability issues (though emperors and kings got killed pretty often).
The peabrain also looked at the asymptote and thought weeeeeeeee!!!!!!! the next downturn is gonna be hell. Is tDrumpf the AntiChrist!!!!