Rating: 
Summary: Living in a World without Color
Review: The book has its moments. Including most of the first 106 pages, although there were a few "huh?'s" I had reading them. I have long been convinced that "sustainable" "just enough" are good words for the world's economy. So I certainly don't disagree that Jack Kemp was full of it when he vowed to "double the size of the economy."But. I really don't understand his solutions. Czech would like us to think that non-rich people who don't work for a living are a little iffy. Well, actually, people who don't work for a living period, I suspect. But if we were to get rid of everything that anyone considered a luxury, would there be jobs for us? I would not have survived the last thirty or forty years without working for a) a bookstore, b) a couple of record stores, c) a master's degree that automatically put me into the useless degree club d) an advertising photographer, e) a nightclub, not to mention, some years later, f) the "Cadillac" of class 8 trucks, Peterbilt. All, I strongly suspect, of those jobs would be what he classifies as useless, contributing to growth, part of what we need to get rid of. The kind of thing that you are supposed to go harangue the workers, owners, stockholders (another category altogether, see the next paragraph) for being associated with such a liquidating economy. Liquidating in this case, means spending for spending's sake--on luxury, or growth, or otherwise non-productive goods or occasions. He also disapproves of investment, presumably, as a consequence, all lending. Possibly pensions, IRA's, savings bonds to pay for the kids' college, and so on and so on. I think he really does believe that savings should be held in the mattress. Banks are instruments of growth, and therefore, to be regarded with deep suspicion. I don't believe that he makes a distinction between luxury and quality. He certainly does not believe that any possessions can make you feel good--at least on a long-term basis. Including the dogs and the bird feeder, even if it is the "free" one that came with the bird seed. Clothes, all jewelry, most live music (if you want to have a nice piano or guitar to play yourself, or if you go a club, or, possibly a sponsored concert), arts and crafts, are singled out for serious disdain. Colorless, depressing, creativity suppressed--although we are allowed to be self-actualizing. It sounds rather as if he looks with approval to the Cuban situation with respect to cars--recycle, recycle, recycle, until there are none left. Although that might be colorful in it's own right. But applied to every manufactured good? Do all craftspeople have to severely criticize anyone who expresses an interest in their work? Should his book have been published in paperback, for anyone with the money to buy? How would libraries be able to afford it if publication was in such limited quantity?
Rating:
Summary: Part I by itself would have earned 5 stars
Review: The first 106 pages of the book are well written and present a number of interesting notions about the dangers of our society's high regard for economic growth. Czech's arguments against the practicality of infinite growth (even though it may be theoretically possible according to neoclassical economists) are clear and well documented. The underlying theme of the book is that neoclassical economists support a theory that the economy can sustain infinite growth, while the ecological economists claim that at some point, the growth will inevitably slow and then stop (more likely crash) because it is impossible in practicality to sustain growth forever. The book starts off with some interesting points about economic growth and sustainability in Part I, and then goes off the deep end in Part II as the author shares his proposed plan for achieving a 'steady-state economy.' The plan in a nutshell: everyone should live very modestly, regardless of their income level, and whenever they notice someone else spending more money than they feel is necessary, they should immediately judge them and try to shame them into changing their ways. The goal is for society to become repulsed by conspicuous consumption to the extent that those in the financial top 1% of society are pressured to reform themselves and give their extra money away to those in need. Although Part I is good enough to justify the purchase price, I would recommend skipping Part II in its entirety.
Rating: 
Summary: The Growth Mania Punctured
Review: The perpetual growth machine is arguably the single most destructive mechanism behind the diminishment of nature. Look no further than the corporate center built next to the new highway in New Jersey, or the new "pre-owned car" dealership plopped down somewhere in the LA Metroplex. Brian Czech, a wildlife-biologist-turned-myth-busting-economist, has punctured the growth forever fairy tale in this lively, easy-to-read call to arms for the forthcoming steady-state revolution. After all, what's so bad about just living modestly in concert with the sky, rocks, birds, whales, salamanders and wild elk? Nothing, of course, but most folks have forgotten our place in nature. Only fools can possibly believe forever in the gospel according to Greenspan. It is indeed time to stop shoveling fuel on this runaway train we call the American economy and begin to relearn how to live in concert with the Earth. Stop the train. We want off.
Rating: 
Summary: Runaway Book
Review: This is a painful review to write. Had I read only the first part of "Runaway Train", paeans of praise for the author would gush forth from my pen. Having read the whole book, I am tempted to pepper my comments with vituperative sarcasm. In the first half of the book, Mr. Czech gives a lively, knowledgeable, and lucid exposition on the philosophy of a "steady state" economy and its foremost proponents and critics. I found Mr. Czech's writing style engaging and witty and his arguments compelling (I'll admit I already shared his sentiments about growth). In the second half of the book, Mr. Czech expounds on his strategies for arriving at the steady state. Here I found Mr. Czech's understanding of human societal dynamics simplistic, even sophomoric - about what you would expect of a biologist straying outside his field of expertise, which is what Mr. Czech is. Reflecting his Darwinian view of the animal world, Mr. Czech believes the steady state will be achieved through human females naturally selecting men who are non-"liquidators" of the earth's resources, sort of analogous to lady peacocks selecting their mates by the paucity of their tail feathers instead of their magnificence. Perhaps Mr. Czech should have followed the lead of many of the great philosophers of history - from Jesus to Marx - and restricted himself to describing the present predicament and the future utopia without going into too much detail about how we get from one to the other. The best I can say about Mr. Czech's ideas are that they are on a par with much else that passes for intelligent social commentary in this country (Robert Reich's notion of "symbolic analysts", expounded in "The Work of Nations", comes to mind). The only other defense I can give for Mr. Czech's naïve prescription is that a realistic appraisal of the possibility of man saving himself from the catastrophic end which events (and books like "Runaway Train") make increasingly obvious is cause for profound pessimism.
Rating:
Summary: Shoveling Fuel for a Runaway Train
Review: Very interesting and thought-provoking book. I firmly agree with the author's assessment of neoclassical economics and our seeming obsession with economic growth (at least the politicians and the media give it enough hype). However, his system of social classification based on the degrees that people "liquidate" the planet's resources and proposed methods of changing liquidators into steady-staters left me skeptical about the feasibility of such an ambitious plan of psychological and social conditioning. Could be Czech's solution is right, and I'm just too pessimistic. How our environment and planet ends up will depend to what extent the masses become enthralled (and tolerant of) crowded cities, suburbia, computers, Hollywood and video games that offer people better and better virtual reality. Lucky for some of us there are still a good number of environmental kooks out there that may be able to keep that from happening.
Rating: 
Summary: This book does more harm than good
Review: While the first part of the book provides compelling reasons for re-examining how we view economic policy, you can find all the same arguments better explained within the introduction of Herman Daly's excellent book Beyond Growth. Czech adds nothing to Daly in repeating him, and the second part of Czech's book is dangerous in its ignorance. Czech basically says that the more something costs, the more it wastes; and therefore the best thing to do to stop waste is to villify spending. He gives several extravagant examples of luxury by members of the upper classes as proof that they waste far more per capita than normal people and thus (psychological) class warfare (though he doesn't call it that) is the answer to our environmental problems.
There are SO many things wrong with this view. First, a $100 bottle of wine doesn't waste any more or less than a $6 bottle of wine, nor does more expensive organic produce cause more environmental damage than cheaper conventional produce (quite the opposite). Did Czech entirely miss Daly's explanation of the difference between quantity/growth and quality/development? Second, if the large estates that Czech chides the upper classes for saves trees and land from cookie-cutter suburban housing developments, I for one am all for them (i.e. the large estates). Third, villifying *anyone* as part of the ecological economics revolution is counter-productive, particularly in that blaming the rich for their waste ignores the hideous waste of the lower classes themselves. (So richer people have more boats, perhaps, but what classes are more likely to have a beat-up car that leaves trails of grey exhaust?) Taking personal responsibility for the greater good is key to reaching a solution -- not passing blame on others. If, for instance, ecological damage (in production, use, and disposal) is taken into account in pricing goods and services (with the proper funds going toward mitigation of the damages rather than general government coffers), then it doesn't matter WHO is doing the purchasing. Czech presents good arguments for fundamental economic reforms; but these arguments are better presented elsewhere, and Czech's proposed solutions are quite awful indeed.
Rating:
Summary: A viable solution to our biggest environmental problem
Review: Written by a wildlife biologist whose personal history is a fascinating patchwork of educational pursuits and jobs that have taken him into cities and wildernesses, as well as onto the high seas, the reader gets the feeling that this book was written from convictions borne in personal experience and verified by academia. Czech addresses the most pervasive and threatening problem of the modern world - our consumerism. This problem is so large and so intimately woven into the fabric of our society that it is easy to get discouraged by it. Czech offers a solution and a reason to feel optimistic, a plan for a nonviolent revolution in public opinion that will stop conspicuous consumption. "Shoveling Fuel for a Runaway Train" is written in popular style, accessible and interesting for the reader who may have studied economics at one time in their life and either detested or forgot it. Anyone concerned about the unsustainable extraction of natural resources should read this book; it offers an effective alternative to the impossible task of inducing restraint among capitalists in a global marketplace.
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