Ecologists Ask Economists: Is The Price Right?

(The Scientist, Vol:10, #6, p. 11, March 18, 1996) One of my beloved grandmothers arrived in the United States as a penniless child. When I was a boy and showed her a good report card, she used to ask me with a smile: "If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?" I didn't know enough then to explain that some people are out of the cash economy, and that some productive assets are not priced by markets in a way that reflects their value to people. In other forms, her question has taken on larger

Written byJoel Cohen

| 4 min read

Save for Later

Listen with Speechify

0:00

4:00

(The Scientist, Vol:10, #6, p. 11, March 18, 1996)

Joel Cohen One of my beloved grandmothers arrived in the United States as a penniless child. When I was a boy and showed her a good report card, she used to ask me with a smile: "If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?"

I didn't know enough then to explain that some people are out of the cash economy, and that some productive assets are not priced by markets in a way that reflects their value to people. In other forms, her question has taken on larger significance in recent exchanges between economists and ecologists.

In December 1995, I published a book called How Many People Can the Earth Support? (New York, W.W. Norton and Co.). There I wrote: "Human numbers currently exceed 5.7 billion and increase by roughly an additional 90 million people per year. . . . The Earth's human ...

Interested in reading more?

Become a Member of

Receive full access to digital editions of The Scientist, as well as TS Digest, feature stories, more than 35 years of archives, and much more!

Join for free today

Already a member?