Once upon a time there were people who consumed only locally grown foods and wore only locally made, natural fiber clothing. Even the construction materials that their homes were made of came from local sources. In this land there were no ten-lane freeways, no railways, nor were there any internal combustion engines to produce the noxious exhausts that polluted the atmosphere with greenhouse gases. There were no foreign goods and no foreign ideas. But paradise had its price.
In this land starvation was common, as was death by plague and countless other diseases. Infant mortality was rampant. Just giving birth was very a dangerous proposition for women. People lived in tiny one-room dirt-floor huts without indoor plumbing. During the winter months even these humble accommodations were often shared with the family's livestock. A lack of proper nutrition and medicines, little sanitation and drinking filthy water resulted in an average life expectancy of around thirty years, for the fortunate.
Where is this land? Anywhere and everywhere in the pre-industrial world for most of human history. Subsistence farming might have been sustainable, but human dignity and human life certainly were not. [adapted from Boudreaux, Braudel, ed.]
