The Wayward Axolotl

Markets are an excellent mechanism for organizing production and distribution, but they aren’t magic. They don’t generate prices ex nihilo . Market prices are circular. The price of a product depends on the prices of the inputs to its production. The price also depends on the supply and demand for the product, given the prices of other products. How is this circularity bootstrapped? In modern societies, prices are bootstrapped in an ad hoc way, without any design or plan. This makes market prices somewhat random. They depend on external conditions in ways that are unclear and unchosen. Prices are information. They control the physical economy, which consists of the physical production and distribution of products. Prices determine what is produced, in what quantity it is produced, and how it is produced. A product is produced if it can be sold at a price above the cost of production. The greater the profit (difference between the market price and the cost of production), the greater...

According to most estimates, the human population passed 8 billion in late 2022. Since about 1970, the global population has been growing linearly, increasing by 1 billion every 12 years or so. This linear growth seems to be a fluke. During that period, the population grew, while the fertility rate declined. The result just happened to be roughly linear growth. Population growth was not uniform across countries or regions. Some countries, such as Nigeria and Pakistan, grew rapidly. Others, such as the United States, grew more slowly. A few, such as Russia and Japan, now have declining populations. In 1970, the global population was less than half of what it is today. China and India were the biggest countries. The Soviet Union was third, with about 240 million people. However, the Russian part of the Soviet Union was significantly smaller than the United States. Of existing countries, the United States was third, and Russia was fourth. Indonesia was fifth, at less...