Bruce Bisset: RIP capitalist complacency

Seems to me we are on the verge of witnessing one of the great fundamental changes in human history: the death of the capitalist financial system.
That event will come as a shock to most, and a source of enormous fear and trepidation for many but, in truth, capitalism has been in a state of degradation trending towards collapse for some time; anyone who understands the basics of the system should be able to acknowledge that.
For capitalism relies, simply, on the growth of capital. Profit is its singular measure of success.
When growth stops, profit stops. Without profit, there is no investment and, therefore, no growth - except through the artificial mechanism of credit.
And when the accumulated debt reaches the point where it exceeds any possibility of ability to repay, the whole monumental edifice of the global financial markets will suffer cardiac arrest.
We are at, or very close to, that point now.
Indeed, many - myself included - would argue we are past that point and living in the "false sunset" of a system which has already suffered a fatal stroke; it simply doesn't yet realise that it is dead.
See, growth can only occur if there are new sources of resources able to be extracted and exploited.
Mankind has become remarkably adept at digging out, cutting down, dredging up and drilling into every conceivable resource this once-rich planet has to offer. So much so that most people believe that technology can continue to deliver solutions to keep the resource streams flowing.
But the problem with planetary resources is that they are finite. Sooner or later the last piece of iron or drop of oil will be extracted and used up, and then there can be no more - unless, that is, we can somehow colonise another planet to exploit.
So the phrase "sustainable economic growth" is an oxymoron. Growth on a single world is inherently unsustainable.
And the real cruncher is that even if more resources could magically be found, the cost of extracting them is at or beyond the ability of people to pay.
Yet this model of ever-increasing growth is the fundamental premise of the capitalist system.
How can the facts be reconciled with the model? They cannot.
That truth is what is now about to bite us.
It's about thirty years since I began predicting that this decade (or by 2025 at the latest) would be the time when the tail caught up with the dog - and so it is proving.
Not that this makes me smarter or wiser than the hundreds of people with more letters after their name than I have in mine now saying the same thing. The evidence is plain: it's just that most folk either choose to ignore or disbelieve it.
Bottom line is, the global economy has been in a period of "reverse growth" for two decades already. That is, debts incurred to "sustain" growth have been mounting at a rate exceeding the nominal growth generated.
Now Greece (twice), Ireland, Iceland and Portugal have all been "bailed out" - loaded with even more debt - and Italy and Spain are about to follow. The United States is itself on the brink of default, and when the Eurozone's debts become too much for them to handle internally, it is the US "reinsurers" who will be hit, triggering market collapse there.
At which point the Chinese will discover their clever strategy for overlordship of Earth - buying the world's debt - is worthless because the indebted nations will be bankrupt and unable to produce what they demand.
Unless we start, now, to face up to this impending change and revolutionise our thinking about business and sustainability, then the period of turmoil that will follow such collapse will see suffering and loss on an unprecedented scale.
Sadly, we cannot avoid that, but we could minimise it - if we wake up fast from our collective golden dreams and act in the best interest of the Earth as a whole, not just ourselves and our soon-to-be-empty pockets.
What prompted this particular diatribe? A report that John Key and co regard New Zealand as "poised for growth".
That's a fairy story. And, as you may recall, most fairy stories do not have happy endings.
That's the right of it. Bruce Bisset is a freelance writer and poet.