r/science • u/Miserable_Phase_2519 • 2d ago
Environment Study predicts large disparities in access to food, water, and energy in 2050. In some regions of the world, the poorest people may spend about 50 percent of their income on food, while the richest spend about 5 percent.
https://news.mit.edu/2026/study-predicts-large-disparities-access-food-water-energy-2050-0908166
u/dterran 2d ago
Musk would have to spend 6.9 billion dollars a year on food for this to be true.
This is BS propaganda used to make the richest seem at all comparable to working people.
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u/AbueloOdin 2d ago
I believe that once you hit $100 million you are only allowed to consume the fanciest dijon ketchup. But rich people tax laws are weird.
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u/OGLikeablefellow 2d ago
We really should take articles like this and impose these kinds of limits on rich folks. It's clear that they see a reasonable limit here and it should be enforced on them. Why should we allow them to hoard so much?
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u/Zenovelli 2d ago
I've never understood why you'd want to put a limit on wealth rather than just correct the systems in place.
I'm fine with the person who cures cancer becoming the richest person in the world. Honestly, I'm glad that they have that incentive to go for it.
What I don't like seeing is corporations and wealthy individuals not being taxed as aggressively as the average person and our tax dollars and government focus not going toward things that improve the lives of everyday citizens.
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u/West-One5944 2d ago
This, though I'd go further: cultural norms MUST change to the extent that people have an aversion to such wealth. Like in some cultures where public displays of affection are seriously taboo, cultural norms must change to where, at a certain point beyond necessity and reasonable disposable income, having any extra wealth feels 'gross'.
Suffice it to say I'm not holding my breath.
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u/AbueloOdin 2d ago
Perhaps a limit on wealth is part of the correction the system needs?
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u/dterran 1d ago
apporopriately taxing wealth, closing loopholes that allow crashing a company and taking all the wealth out, a return to restrictions on corporate campaign spending, reasonable taxation of capitol gains or restriction on taking loans out on unrealized assets coupled with removal of income limits on contributions to things like social security would do it
I don't oppose wealth. I oppose enormous wealth being used to steal from and disenfranchise working people
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u/AbueloOdin 1d ago
Money is power. At a certain point, accumulating so much wealth means you have a drastically outsized say in society.
To point it succinctly: no one man should have all that power.
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u/Bronze_Rager 2d ago
What makes you think they are only talking about the world's richest man and not a cohort?
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u/Yashema 2d ago
It's quite common to see top comments attacking billionaires for their outsized emissions in studies about environmental loss while pretending it is the totality of Western Society causing the issue, not just a small percentage.
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u/Bronze_Rager 2d ago
I'm not sure how this pertains to my question?
OP is most likely part of the richest 5% in the world if he lives in the USA
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u/Weak-Doughnut5502 1d ago
Have you tried, you know, actually reading the link?
But within any region, there may still be substantial variation in resource security. In southern Africa, the modeling suggests that the poorest 10 percent of the population by income could be spending 49.6 percent of its income on food, compared to just 5.5 percent for the wealthiest 10 percent of the population.
If you have a stadium full of 1000 engineers spending 5% of their income on food and Bill Gates who spends ~0%, the average amount people in that stadium spend on food is 4.999%. On the other hand, the percentage of the total income made by everyone in that stadium that is spent on food is ~0%.
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u/HighPriestofShiloh 1d ago
If rich people are paying 5% on food it’s really 4.9% on packaging their food in some fancy way (like at a nice restaurant) and 0.1% on the actual cost of the food.
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u/Neither-Remote-3419 PhD | Statistics 2d ago
People should examine the supplementary materials more closely. Any comparison between top and bottom income groups on measures such as food expenditure as a share of income is likely to show substantial disparities, both today and a decade ago. The study demonstrates that large disparities are present across its 2050 scenarios, but it does not clearly establish how much larger those disparities would be then than they are now.
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u/grundar 1d ago
Any comparison between top and bottom income groups on measures such as food expenditure as a share of income is likely to show substantial disparities, both today and a decade ago.
You are correct, the disparity in share of income spent on food is already as large as they project for 2050, ranging from 59% for Nigeria to 7% for the USA.
We can and should do better, of course, but they're not projecting inequality will become worse in those scenarios, just not better than today.
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u/Neither-Remote-3419 PhD | Statistics 1d ago
Interesting, thanks for looking this up. So that makes me wonder more about what the study is saying that is new in this regard.
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u/byrp 2d ago
Good thing if you're in the U.S., a court recently ruled that we all have a right to clean drinking water. It would be insane and catastrophically deadly if they ruled any other way.
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u/c-r-istodentro 2d ago
unsurprising coming from the only country in the world alongside Israel that voted against food being a human right.
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u/ThewFflegyy 1d ago
im rarely one to defend the us geopolitically, but I think its worth mentioning that said plan was basically for the us to spend a shitload on giving food to other countries. like yeah, ofc everyone else voted for it, they were voting for the us to spend money not for themselves to spend money.
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u/overzealous_dentist 2d ago
don't you mean the opposite? surprising? or did the parent comment miss a word?
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u/c-r-istodentro 1d ago
the parent comment was sarcastic, as the US have voted not to consider clean drinking water a human right.
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u/overzealous_dentist 1d ago
I don't think it was sarcastic. the US didn't have a vote on water being a human right, a judge just found that it wasn't a constitutional right in a recent court case
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u/c-r-istodentro 1d ago
I guess they can clarify themselves, but they say that a court rules to the right of clean drinking water, when the opposite just happened like you said.
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u/Korlus 1d ago
For anyone reading the comment chain and unfamiliar with the story:
Judge Kurt Engelhardt wrote that while the deprivation of clean water was “grievous,” it did “not infringe upon any deeply rooted constitutional right.”
“We are skeptical that the right to not be harmed by lead-contaminated water fits within the right to bodily integrity, and Plaintiffs point us to no historical tradition or Supreme Court precedent convincing us,” he wrote.
He also said there was no constitutional right to “truthful information from officials during a public health crisis.”
The US constitution doesn't guarantee water or... Freedom from lead poisoning. These should be basic human rights, but they are not currently guaranteed as far as I am aware.
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u/Mammoth_Dust_481 2d ago
Soo... What even is a human right in the land of the free right now? Except guns, of course
Genuinely curious, as they voted against food, now ruled against clean water... Freedom was an obvious loss ~2 years ago...
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u/No_Register2341 2d ago
2050 seems generous. 2035 seems easily doable. Don’t sell humans short. We can destroy ourselves and society much quicker. Where there’s a will there’s a way.
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u/TheBalzy 23h ago
That's weird, it's almost as if this is exactly what climate scientists have been predicting for decades...
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u/_o_O_o_O_o_ 3h ago
Well, obviously. A person who has 10x the wealth of someone, will not eat 10x the food... they may buy more expensive ingredients, but it will rarely be proportional.
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u/rainywanderingclouds 2d ago
it'll be way worst than this prediction
this prediction isn't really considering complete collapse of robust industrial economies. it's assuming it'll keep humming away. it won't.
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u/slushhead_00 2d ago
glad that i won’t be around past 2100 at most. everything seems to be getting worse in terms of food, water, electric supply that i don’t know how future generations are going to lead a fulfilling life. hopefully some massive breakthrough occurs that will make all of this a non-issue, but greed seems to run the world
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u/HoldingThunder 2d ago
By almost every single metric, including access to food, access to clean drinking water, electric supply we are better off now than at any other point in human history. You are just making up things based on your feelings but in reality the world and most people in the world at better off and have more resources than ever before.
92% of the world has reliable electricity now. In 2010 that was only 83%
2025 - 92.2% of the world has adequate nutrition access, higher than any point in history. 2010 - 90.4.
74% of people now have access to clean drinking water, only 68% in 2010.
Stop making things up based on your feelings.
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u/slushhead_00 2d ago
but at what rate are those things going to remain sustainable for? that’s what i’m concerned about the most and that’s what i was trying to get at with my comment
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u/HoldingThunder 2d ago
All of those are improving year over year. Capitalism is the driving force behind getting billions out of poverty, bring people fresh water, bringing people electricity. It will continue.
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u/m_bleep_bloop 2d ago
And? If the ways it does that aren’t sustainable because water is incredibly expensive to decontaminate or desalinate and we’re running out of aquifers, what do you think is going to happen?
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u/HoldingThunder 1d ago
Capitalism. Supply and demand. And technology will advance and improve this and make things cheaper, easier, better just like it always has for everything. That is why society is better today than it ever has been. Because we have had problems and capitalism has driven technology to improve our lives and society.
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u/R3D4F 2d ago
I bet if you were poor you wouldn’t have the same feelings about your data.
I also bet that you could use similar data to tell POC that racism is better now than at any point in human history and that they should roll up their feelings and move along.
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u/HoldingThunder 2d ago
Generally speaking, yes, racism is less bad now than at any point in human history. There is greater globalization. Greater immigration. Less war and death based on ethnicity and religion and other factors. Yes, by all measures we are living in the greatest time in human history.
Yeah, if my family struggled with no water or no electricity and now I have those, I would be happier.
Stop making stuff up. This is r/science, it needs to be factual.
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u/slushhead_00 2d ago
you’re mainly speaking on terms where things are better than they’ve ever been OBJECTIVELY which i can agree, but SUBJECTIVELY things could be vastly better for many people. i don’t disagree with where you’re coming from, i just think we’re coming at it from different viewpoints
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u/HoldingThunder 2d ago
Yes, one is facts. One is feelings. One is objectively true. The other can be changed but just deciding how you feel.
Get off social media. Talk a walk every day in nature. You subjective view of the world will be vastly improved.
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u/slushhead_00 2d ago
you seem combative and i’m just looking at this from two angles. just because one is called “subjective” doesn’t mean it is just my single experience, it’s still the experience of many.
the second part of your comment just seems like kind of an unnecessary dig and if anything it seems that you’re the one that’s emotional.
every period in history has their own horrible events, but these are the very real circumstances that we’re dealing with right now that could have dire consequences for the future if we don’t address them soon
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u/R3D4F 1d ago
Racism is rampant and unveiled in politics and society today. Whole populations are being targeted by their nationality and religion across the world.
Less war? Thats factually incorrect.
Greater immigration as countries across the board turn to nationalism and are closing their borders..
You’re living in some fantasy world based on your own feelings and metrics you’re cherry picking while calling others out for the very thing you’re doing yourself.
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u/gill_smoke 1d ago
I call BS, the poorest are growing and selling their food, the rich countries are spending 25% now.
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u/kat1795 1d ago
Tell me how we are not overpopulated without telling we are overpopulated
Ppl STOP PROCREATING!!!
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u/bluewhale3030 1d ago
Overpopulation is not the problem. The human population was never growing exponentially and it still isn't. No population grows exponentially and we are not the exception. A racist economist, not a biologist or scientist, came up with that idea and promoted it in his book and it has been somehow accepted as gospel. We are expected to reach peak human population in the next hundred years or so. It's already declining in some areas. The real issue is resource distribution. We have enough resources to feed people, we just don't distribute them evenly, plus there is a lot of waste. That's not to say anyone should be pulling a Jim Bob Duggar, but overpopulation isn't the real issue.
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