Criticizing globalism and the externalities of "wanting the world economy to grow" is not an argument against increasing the standards of living worldwide, and I'm not sure why you're conflating the two.
His point is that one of the main avenues for the poor to leave poverty is through capitalistic action. If you are arguing for the restriction of that behavior, you are arguing for the restriction of opportunities to leave behind poverty.
As pathetic as it is to see people camping out at Wal-mart to buy products they do not particularly need (indeed, many of them would be better off if they saved the money that they will spend today), one of the results of that behavior is additional economic opportunity for poor countries and poor people.
You could state a case that the net gain from this behavior makes it not worth having, as the social and environmental costs of using natural and human resources to produce unneeded products obfuscates the value of the resultant economic growth, but then you would need to present data and math.
"If you are arguing for the restriction of that behavior, you are arguing for the restriction of opportunities to leave behind poverty."
That doesn't follow. Laissez-faire capitalism does not necessarily lead to greater class mobility. The idea that one must abandon "restriction" of capitalism to offer the greatest benefit to any individual is ridiculous.
There are bucketloads of empirical evidence for "one of the main avenues for the poor to leave poverty is through capitalistic action". GP didn't appear to argue against any and all restriction on capitalism, but that those (like AdBusters and Occupy[1]) who argue broadly against capitalism (rather than specific shortcomings), implicitly (and probably involuntarily) argue against "opportunities to leave behind poverty".
I never made that statement. I did, however, claim that a major cause of the increase in the wealth of nations is capitalism. I made this claim because I have studied economics and history and I have read and heard multiple compelling arguments supporting this claim.
Do you have any data to support that statement? You are going to need a pretty massive data set and significant argument to demonstrate both the cause and the negative aspect of the effect.
As pathetic as it is to see people camping out at Wal-mart to buy products they do not particularly need (indeed, many of them would be better off if they saved the money that they will spend today), one of the results of that behavior is additional economic opportunity for poor countries and poor people.
You could state a case that the net gain from this behavior makes it not worth having, as the social and environmental costs of using natural and human resources to produce unneeded products obfuscates the value of the resultant economic growth, but then you would need to present data and math.