Inside The End of Abundance
If you have landed here wondering what The End of Abundance is actually about, this post is the short version — the argument in a few hundred words instead of a few hundred pages. The book has one central claim: the age in which clean water was effectively unlimited is over, and the institutions we built during that age of abundance are quietly failing us. The fix is not more fear. It is better economics.
Abundance built our habits; scarcity breaks them
For most of history, water was something you took, not something you managed. Laws, prices and customs assumed there was always more. The book's starting point is that this assumption has expired in much of the world — and that the pain we feel in droughts and shortages is really the sound of old institutions grinding against a new reality.
“We can respond to the end of abundance with old ideas, or adopt new tools specifically designed to address water scarcity.”
Two kinds of water choices
The book is built around a simple split that organises the whole discussion:
Part I — Personal water choices. Water from the tap, dirty water, the liquid lifestyle, water for profit, food and water, and energy. These are the decisions individuals and businesses make, where prices and incentives do most of the work.
Part II — Social water choices. Managers and politicians, dams and pipes, the environment, climate change, the human right to water, and water “wars.” These are the decisions we make together, where institutions and politics matter as much as price.
The recurring theme: incentives matter
More than any single policy, the book keeps returning to one idea — incentives matter. When water is priced near zero, people treat it as worthless. When prices, rights and rules reflect scarcity, people conserve, trade and invest without being lectured. The book is not anti-government or pro-market for its own sake; it is pro-whatever-sends-the-honest-signal.
Who it is for
It was written for the non-academic reader — the citizen, the manager, the curious engineer, the politician — not for economists. There is humour, there are real-world examples, and there is a glossary. You can read a few sample chapters from the sample PDF, and if it clicks, you can buy the full book.
The rest of this blog expands on individual ideas from the book. Start with scarcity is not shortage and why pricing water correctly matters.
