While “eat less exercise more” may be fine advice at a personal level, it isn’t a sufficient answer to the society-wide epidemic of obesity that we currently face.
I disagree, although I found the evidence in the linked posts to be rather weak. When I think of “calories in, calories out” I don’t immediately think, “Therefore we should push for voluntary dieting changes.” There are likely involuntary and external factors related to our consumption, which act through the CICO mechanism, driving the obesity crisis.
It’s a bit like if we were debating the “income minus spending theory of wealth.” One hand, you’re right that “just spend less” is unhelpful advice for people. However, the theory is not actually an incorrect one. If people are actually getting poorer, then it’s either because their incomes went down, or their spending went up, or both. Denying the basic mechanism won’t lead to a solution. It will just make you confused forever.
I don’t quite understand what you mean. National wealth works just like individual wealth. You linked to the Wikipedia page on “Austerity” (presumably because you think such policies do not work) but I don’t understand your point. Do you think either spending cuts or tax increases usually never increase national wealth? I also don’t think those things are equivalent to national income or expenses.
Yes, cutting spending/raising taxes (aka austerity) is anti-correlated with GDP growth.
My point is more so that micro vs macro policy (whether economic or health-related) cannot be reduced to simply “add up the parts”. To take a specific example, the push to make us all eat margarine instead of butter because it contains less saturated fat was almost certainly a mistake.
The “income minus spending theory of wealth” when applied to states implies that if the state cuts spending then the economy would be better. But that’s definitely not true always (for example, research spending), but in the general sense it’s also not true according to some macroeconomic models (like Modern Monetary Theory). Since the state’s wealth is the economy as a whole, not it’s balance sheet, modeling income as taxes and spending as government expenditures doesn’t line up. Increasing taxes decreases the size of the economy but prevents inflation from occurring. Government expenditures increases the size of the economy by stimulating it but can cause inflation. A state increases its wealth by having expenditures and taxes work together correctly to stimulate the economy without unreasonable levels of inflation. That’s leaving aside trade with foreign countries, but it works fairly similarly.
I disagree, although I found the evidence in the linked posts to be rather weak. When I think of “calories in, calories out” I don’t immediately think, “Therefore we should push for voluntary dieting changes.” There are likely involuntary and external factors related to our consumption, which act through the CICO mechanism, driving the obesity crisis.
It’s a bit like if we were debating the “income minus spending theory of wealth.” One hand, you’re right that “just spend less” is unhelpful advice for people. However, the theory is not actually an incorrect one. If people are actually getting poorer, then it’s either because their incomes went down, or their spending went up, or both. Denying the basic mechanism won’t lead to a solution. It will just make you confused forever.
FWIW, I also think the “income minus spending theory of wealth” works great for individuals and literally backwards for economies as a whole.
I don’t quite understand what you mean. National wealth works just like individual wealth. You linked to the Wikipedia page on “Austerity” (presumably because you think such policies do not work) but I don’t understand your point. Do you think either spending cuts or tax increases usually never increase national wealth? I also don’t think those things are equivalent to national income or expenses.
Yes, cutting spending/raising taxes (aka austerity) is anti-correlated with GDP growth.
My point is more so that micro vs macro policy (whether economic or health-related) cannot be reduced to simply “add up the parts”. To take a specific example, the push to make us all eat margarine instead of butter because it contains less saturated fat was almost certainly a mistake.
The “income minus spending theory of wealth” when applied to states implies that if the state cuts spending then the economy would be better. But that’s definitely not true always (for example, research spending), but in the general sense it’s also not true according to some macroeconomic models (like Modern Monetary Theory). Since the state’s wealth is the economy as a whole, not it’s balance sheet, modeling income as taxes and spending as government expenditures doesn’t line up. Increasing taxes decreases the size of the economy but prevents inflation from occurring. Government expenditures increases the size of the economy by stimulating it but can cause inflation. A state increases its wealth by having expenditures and taxes work together correctly to stimulate the economy without unreasonable levels of inflation. That’s leaving aside trade with foreign countries, but it works fairly similarly.