description: The global ecosystem, which provides a vast array of indispensible resources and services to human beings, can be seen as a form of capital that can never be replaced by any combination of human labour, wealth, and technology. The Earth's natural capital endowment is under severe strain from rapidly increasing human economic activity and population. The remaining natural capital is becoming inadequate to allow us to live as we have in the past, much less to expand the global economy as everyone demands. This text argues that mainstream economics has misled people and policy-makers by viewing natural capital as only a single, rather unimportant, factor of economic production. In contrast, ecological economics views it as the very foundation of the economy.
language: English
title: Natural Capital and Human Economic Survival
titlecomplete: Natural Capital and Human Economic Survival
ratings_count: 3
publisher: Sinauer Associates Inc