Are We Seeing Dematerialization of World GDP?

Abstract

Production of commodities and industrial products typically declines in relative terms as countries get richer. Does this mean that economic growth will become dematerialized and take place without being accompanied by a rise in the use of materials? Do we see signs of this already happening? We look at the production of cement and thirteen minerals 1960–2019 and find no evidence of dematerialization. Production of cement and eight minerals has grown more rapidly than world GDP and that of three minerals more rapidly than world population. Extraction of most minerals has accelerated rather than stagnated since the turn of the century.