Comment by ZenoArrow
7 hours ago
> It would be good to know which members of the EU are currently experiencing unchecked economic growth.
All of them.
You can see recent stats (from 2025) on GDP growth here, all the handful of countries with negative growth are outside the EU:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_real_GDP_...
You may be confusing fast growth with unchecked growth. If you see sustained YoY growth of a couple of percent this can quickly accelerate over many years. For example, 2% growth means doubling the size in 35 years. This has a notable impact on the natural world, as the economic system is linked to our material reality.
If you're going to quibble about OP's implied definition of "unchecked economic growth", then you should at least provide a better one that isn't just "economic growth".
The "unchecked" in unchecked economic growth just refers to the fact that no one is applying the brakes to this growth, i.e. it's being allowed to continue uninterrupted. This is only a problem when you understand the downsides of continuing with business as usual (mainly linked to the damage to the natural world).
According to your link the EU's growth rate is just 0.7% so only 25% growth in 35 years, and some of that will come from things that have little or no impact on nature, or reduce the impact on nature. For example, replacing a coal power plant with solar adds to GDP but reduces pollution.
> reduce the impact on nature
Less bad is not the same as good. For example, electricity from solar panels is less bad than electricity from fossil fuels but there's considerable disruption to the natural world to produce them, not least of which involves mining for raw materials. In the same vein, we're nowhere near reducing pollution to safe levels or even reducing our overall pollution, all we've managed so far is a reduction in the rate of growth of fossil fuel use, it's still going up YoY.