Climate change and scarcity chip away at de-growth taboo

De-growth — the idea that a finite planet cannot sustain ever-increasing consumption — is about the closest you can get to a heresy in economics, where growth is widely held as the best route to prosperity.

But, as climate change accelerates and supply chain disruptions offer rich-world consumers an unaccustomed taste of scarcity, the theory is becoming less taboo, and some have started to ponder what a de-growth world might look like.