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by linkregister 78 days ago
For an environmentmaxxer, eliminating upper-middle class jobs is extremely effective, as this group consumes the lion's share of resources and bears the greatest impact on carbon emissions. Remember that the majority of industry is upstream of consumption.

Not endorsing this world view, just noting that the wealthiest 1% of people in the world (encompasses most US citizens) have an enormously outsized impact on climate.
2 comments
CobrastanJorji 78 days ago
The "upper middle class" is not strictly defined, but they are pretty clearly the folks below the wealthiest 1%. You can't be in the middle without something on either side.

They certain consume far more than the poor, on account of having resources, but they also consume far less than the wealthiest 1%.

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linkregister 78 days ago
You are almost certainly in the global 1% of the wealthy [1]. Compared to developing nations' residents, we have an order of magnitude greater impact on the environment.

1. https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-17512040

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Legend2440 78 days ago
>Remember that the majority of industry is upstream of consumption.

People forget this. Oil companies may have dug up the oil, but they did so because we paid them to, so we could use the energy for good and useful things.

Climate change isn't 'evil billionaire companies are ruining the world', it's 'these things we did to improve our lives turn out to have side effects'.

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sam_lowry_ 78 days ago
The discussion is about the current generation of LLMs. It's not yet clear whether side-effects outweigh the advantages.

OTOH, I can already argue with numbers at hand that Bitcoin made the world poorer and worse off.

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