What would be the economic impact off...

Discussion in 'Business & Economics' started by alexb123, Dec 14, 2005.

  1. alexb123 The Amish web page is fast! Valued Senior Member

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    half the worlds population dying? By half I mean a random half of everyone on the planet?

    Surely we would all be rich as we would only have half the people to spend everyones money? But its not that simple is it! So what would happen?
     
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  3. spuriousmonkey Banned Banned

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    maybe there is something like a 'critical mass' also in economics. Things stop working when they drop below this critical mass.

    I have no idea. Interesting thought though, although I don't see a random half of the population dying soon.

    wait, funeral services sector would boom!!!! and then crash...
     
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  5. nirakar ( i ^ i ) Registered Senior Member

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    If a disease quickly wiped out half the population at random from each nation and then the disease was gone:

    Our complex economy is made of people networked by established business and trading patterns. Any large disruption to these relationships and patterns will collapse the global econonmy. There would however be no loss to scientific expertise, and the ratio of humans to natural resources, houses, cars, toys, tools, and industrial plants would actually improve. When the people get over the shock to their confidence and establish new trading patterns and business relationships to replace the old broken relationships, then the surviving people will become wealthier than the pre-plague population was. My guess is it would take ten to fifteen years to recover and become wealthier than the pre-plague people.
     
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  7. alexb123 The Amish web page is fast! Valued Senior Member

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    Nirakar I am not sure this would be the case, because you might have more wealth but who is then going to do all the work? Therefore, labour costs would be greater which would cancel out much of the wealth gain?
     
  8. alexb123 The Amish web page is fast! Valued Senior Member

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    Also what about all the goods that the dead can no longer use? We would have a massive surplus from a world stocked for 6 Billion people?
     
  9. nirakar ( i ^ i ) Registered Senior Member

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    If you are wealthy now, then the increase in the value of labor relative to stuff would make you poorer. I believe it was the black death in the 1300s I was hearing about on a TV show in which they said knights and land owners who were used to being taken care of by servants had to learn to grow their own food. The sharecroppers got to keep much more of their production because the ratio of labor to lands/lords had changed.

    What is wealth? Doesn't wealth = having access to stuff and services and food?

    When I say "people" would be "wealthier" I mean the median people, or people as an average would be wealthier. I do not mean that the wealthy would be wealthier. The poor could become wealthier and still be poor.

    If each person had the stuff of two people, wouldn't we be wealthier? When my dad died, I got some of his stuff and therefore became wealthier. Wealthier does not mean happier. We might be traumatized by the loss of so many friends and family.
     

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